Class 

Bade . A I W^___ 
Copyright N° 



ILLINOIS CONFERENCE— SERMONS 



A VOLUME OF SERMONS 

I 

BY MINISTERS OF THE 

ILLINOIS CONFERENCE 

OF THE 

METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH 

WITH AN 

INTRODUCTION 

BY REV. H. H. ONEAL, D. D. 



COMPILED AND PUBLISHED BY 

REV. GRANT B. WILDER 

SHEIyBYVIIXE, HvL. 
I9OI 



THE LIBRARY OF 

CONGRESS, 
Two Copies Received 

APR, 27 1901 

Copyright entry 
CLASS Os XXc. Urn. 
COPY B. 



COPYRIGHT 1901 
BY 

GRANT B. WILDER 



I 



PREFACE. 



This volume is published: 

ist. To do good. The distribution of three thousand 
copies of such a book can but aid and uplift those who 
may read. It is issued with the prayer that it may be 
used as an agent of consolation, edification, and salvation. 

2d. To group in an enduring form the sermons of those 
men who have made our Illinois Methodism the power 
it is. It will be a pleasure and blessing to thousands to 
look upon these faces and read, these sermons, long after 
these servants of the Lord Jesus have passed to the Church 
Triumphant. 

The publisher wishes to state that the limited number 
of the sermons used is no intimation that the brethren con- 
tributing are the only able preachers in the Conference. 
Others were asked who could not contribute; pastors are 
busy men; and many others would have been asked, had 
we not reached the limit of our space. Books at the pres- 
ent day must be of such limitations as to sell for a popular 
price. 

We heartily thank all who have aided us ; Dr. Qneal for 
his able introduction, and each preacher for his contribu- 
tion. These sermons have been sent us by men who were 
burdened with official cares; "sacrifice" is written between 
every line; "without money and without price" has the 
work been done; we trust that the whole conference may 
join us in our expressions of gratitude to these men who 
have thus given to us one more pleasant memento of 
their life work. 

Our permission to use the sermon from the pen of our 



4 



PREFACE. 



sainted Bishop Ninde was received but a short time before 
the bishop's death. Because of this, and because of what 
he was and still is to the church, we are particularly glad 
to have his sermon appear in this volume. 
Very truly, 

Grant B. Wilder, Publisher. 



INTRODUCTION. 

BY REV. H. H. ONEAL. 

Pastor at Shelbyville. 

The preacher's supreme work is to preach. To this he 
is called. For this he is commissioned and sent. In this 
he will be sustained. Through this men will be attracted 
awakened, convinced, persuaded, encouraged, instructed, and 
led to Christ. It is God's way of winning the world. In 
the office of shepherd of the, flock, there may be many sub- 
sidiary ministries not to be overlooked, but they should be 
held in subordination and service to the one great work. 
Whatever else the preacher may or may not do, he musi 
preach. 

The preacher must preach well, in these days. This 
has always been true, but never more so than now. Mere 
mediocrity will not do. We hear much about the "Preach- 
ing required by the times." The "times" are peculiar, won- 
derfully changed, and for the better; but human nature and 
human need, the divine gospel and divine method, are not 
changed. No doubt the conditions of the new times have 
raised the standard of preaching, so that the good preacher 
of the past might not be so classed today. Many of the 
fathers were great preachers, measured by any standard, 
old or new. The preacher of today however, must meet 
larger demands and submit to severer tests than at any for- 
mer time. He need not be sensational, nor erratic, nor re- 
sort to arts or tricks of any sort- — indeed he must not; but 
he must be honest and sincere, deeply thoughtful, widely 
informed, cultured in manners, mind and heart, filled with 
his message, and then, with the old time fervor of the Holy 

5 



6 



INTRODUCTION. 



Ghost to put him cn rapport with his audience, he cannot 
fail of reaching a high degree of excellence as a preacher. 

The preacher must preach the Word. If he is himself 
a thorough student of the Word, he will never lack for 
themes, themes worthy to be presented to any audience, 
and at the same time worthy of his most strenuous effort, 
both in preparation and presentation. Never was there 
greater demand for the pure Word of Life, than now. Peo- 
ple of all ranks and stations and occupations and conditions 
are hungering for it and ought to have it. Nothing, how- 
ever philosophically true, or morally good, or aesthetically 
beautiful, can be substituted for the Word of God. There 
is no legitimate demand, but nevertheless something of a 
clamor, for a "popular" ministry — a compromising min- 
istry — a ministry which shall bring only a message of "sweet- 
ness and light." There are strong forces playing about the 
preacher, to bear him into the "swim" of life about him, 
where he may easily drift with the tide. He is mightily 
tempted sometimes to emasculate the gospel, to tone down 
the truth, to dull the edge of the sword, that it may not 
cut to the quick. Let him forever remind himself that 
he has one supreme, overtowering, all-mastering work to 
do, to "Preach the Word." And like his great prototype, 
let him not "shun to declare the whole counsel of God." 

The preacher's vocation is an exalted one. He is the 
messenger of a divine forgiveness; the minister of a divine 
reconciliation; the herald of an everlasting peace; the 
prophet of the light of the world. 

"His theme divine, 
His office sacred, his credentials clear, 
By him the violated law speaks out 
Its thunders ; and by him, in strains as sweet 
As angels use, the Gospel whispers peace!" 

This volume will find its principal field of circulation 
within the limits of the Illinois Conference. This is, Metho- 



INTRODUCTION. 



7 



distically, historic ground. In years that are gone giants 
lived and wrought and flourished here. Most of those 
whose names are found herein are indigenous to this soil. 
Some were cotemporary with the heroes of that glorious 
past and are held in equal honor with them. Others, in 
their early ministry, sat at the feet of those masters and 
•are worthy sons of such noble sires. These are but speci- 
mens of the sermonic ability of the Illinois Conference. 
"There are others/' many others, who in the pulpit are the 
peers of any who have contributed to this volume. The 
hope is entertained that this work will be fully appreciated 
by those for whom it has been specially prepared, and that 
it will fulfill a mission of blessing, long after the contributors 
have passed to their reward. 

"No power can die that ever wrought for truth; 
Thereby a law of nature it became, 
And lives unwithered in its sinewy youth, 
When he who called it forth is but a name." 
Shelbyville, 111., March 5, 1901. 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 

BY BISHOP NINDE. 
"He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." — I Cor. 1 131. 

The Corinthian Christians were greatly given to self- 
adulation. As a natural result they fell to quarreling among 
themselves. They became split up into factions and indulged 
in those rancorous animosities which scandalized the Chris- 
tion name and brought great grief to the heart of the apostle. 
And so, in his pastoral letters he points out the unreasonable- 
ness and wickedness of their unseemly disputes. He shows 
them that whatever endowments they might possess were 
purely gifts of grace, and in no sense a proper occasion for 
selfish boasting ; that if any were entitled to boast, he him- 
self was, yet so far from doing so he rather gloried in his 
infirmities, that the power of Christ might rest upon him. 

The Epistles to the Corinthians are invaluable to us, 
partly for the insight they afford us into the individual and 
church life of the early Christians, and partly because their 
warnings and instructions are as applicable to us as they 
were to those immediately addressed. This is especially 
true of the passage I have chosen as a text, where the apostle 
summarizes and generalizes his teachings in a maxim of uni- 
versal and perpetual application : "He that glorieth, let him 
glory in the Lord." 

Some words in familiar use seem well-nigh indefinable. 
We may trace their etymology through all its mazes ; we may 
collect what seem their appropriate synonyms ; we may hedge 
them about with grammatical rules ; yet the soul of the 
words will defy our powers of analysis and definition. The 



8 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



9 



significant word of the text is a case in point. The word 
"glory" is in every one's thoughts and on every one's lips. 
It is employed by persons of various grades of intelligence. 
It is used by the scholar and by the boor, yet probably 
not one in a thousand of those who use it has ever con- 
sulted a dictionary to ascertain its exact meaning. It is one 
of those passion-words whose subtle meaning suggests itself, 
or whose sense we gather from the common usage of the 
words. When General Sherman, on that eventful morning 
in our civil war, lifted his eyes from the valley in which his 
tents were pitched to the heights of Lookout Mountain, when 
the fogs had cleared away, and seeing our flag waving in 
triumph over the battlefield, cried, "Yonder, boys is Old 
Glory/' his words seemed an inspiration not only to the 
boys in blue, but to the heart of the nation. And now, when- 
ever we behold the symbol of our country's honor and great- 
ness floating from bastion or school house or masthead, our 
hearts instinctively greet it as Old; Glory. 

Whenever, in a love feast, some venerable saint, her face 
aglow with the light of the inner paradise, exclaims with 
suppressed voice, "glory," we all know what she means. 
Were we to ask her to explain her meaning, she would simply 
turn upon us a surprised look, and with greater fervency 
repeat the word "glory." 

There is a certain sublimated mood of exalted and 
exultant feeling which every one is capable of who has 
a human heart within him. That mood may be awakened 
in many ways and by many things. It may be excited by 
a flashing thought which enters the mind uninvited and 
unannounced, or by a flood of thoughts that throng the mind 
with a sudden rush. It may come from the memory of some 
rapturous experience of the long ago, or from any ecstatic 
hope on whose border-land we are pressing. It may spring 
from the contagion of another enkindled soul, or by the 
presence of a multitude who are roused and thrilled by a 



10 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



common impulse. Perhaps nothing is more fitted to excite 
our emotional nature than the magic of eloquent speech. I 
was conversing not long since with a friend, when he sud- 
denly shifted the conversation by asking me what was the 
greatest flight of eloquence I had ever listened to. I had 
no time for reflection and gave him the unpremeditated an- 
swer that I thought the greatest continued flight of elo- 
quence I had ever listened to was from that prince of 
natural orators, John B. Gough. It was soon after his 
reformation, and just as he had started out as a temperance 
advocate. He was wholly untrained; he seemed entirely 
indifferent to his personal appearance or to any niceties of 
phrase or manner; but he was surcharged with his theme, 
and he simply talked to us out of the fullness of his vivid 
experiences and intense convictions, and we were swept 
along on the torrent of his rude but impassioned speech. 
My friend said the greatest flight of eloquence he had ever 
listened to> was from Henry Ward Beecher, in the three min- 
utes peroration to a lecture he once heard him deliver. He 
had been speaking in quite a composed way, when suddenly 
his face became illumined with an almost supernatural radi- 
ance. The whole place seemed quite darkened as my 
friend's gaze was riveted on the transfigured face of the 
speaker, while he uttered with marvelous intonation these 
words "The God who through the ages has guided this 
storm-battered world from darkness to the dawning, from 
dawning to the noon-tide, will surely keep it till the evening 
shadows gather." 

A speaker or hearer in such a mood is in the true frame 
for glorying. I do not believe the Author of our being in- 
tended that this mood should be long continued, yet I am 
convinced that this mood, to a modulated degree, should be 
• the habitual and normal temper of the soul. 

It is a deplorable fact that great numbers of men seem 
to have lost the capability of high enthusiasm, and to have 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



It 



settled into a passionless and prosaic existence. Life has 
lost its aroma and become stale and commonplace. They 
are devoid of sentiment and always look upon things from 
the severely practical side. Men are absorbed with the stern 
necessities of gaining a livelihood. Women are consumed 
with the irksome cares of house-keeping. Certainly, the 
most common tasks of life should be illumined with a heav- 
enly radiance, and they might be if we were always dwelling 
upon the heights, with our souls attuned to celestial har- 
monies. But alas ! our souls are too often sadly out of 
tune. 

Often the insipidity of living results from a surfeit of 
worldly enjoyments. Men glory in the flesh and in nothing 
but the flesh, and at last the outraged spirit avenges itself 
and their most coveted delights pall on the glutted soul. 
Sometimes an ironical temper is cultivated which sneers at 
the possibility of genuine and generous feeling. Not infre- 
quently all exhibitions of deep and especially tender feelings 
are thought to betoken a childish imbecility. A man whose 
feelings have overcome him seems to think that an explana- 
tion is necessary. It is something to be apologized for, and 
he is heard to say, "I was completely unmanned — I wept like 
a child," as if the giving way to powerful emotion evinced 
a childish weakness rather than a manly grace. 

It is a remarkable fact that men who have lost the capac- 
ity for high and worthy glorying are often keenly sensitive 
to low and hellish excitants. It has been forcibly and truly 
said that unless the spirit shall elevate and refine the flesh, 
the flesh will surely stupefy and degrade the spirit. Multi- 
tudes are engaged in the sad task of carnifying their natural 
instincts and affections till the inverted soul, in place of 
aspiring upward and Godward, sinks to retrieveless depths 
of moral debasement and ruin. I had the privilege, many 
years ago, of hearing Horce Bushnell preach his famous 
sermon on "The Greatness of Man Shown by the Magnifi- 



12 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



cent Ruin he Makes." It was a wonderful sermon by a very 
remarkable man. 

It is not the tame and phlegmatic sinner who makes 
havoc in the world. It is rather the highly-strung and pas- 
sionate offender; the man who glories in his shame; who 
bows his whole being at the shrine of his towering lusts; 
who has the genius to plan and execute great schemes of 
evil. We speak of the "carnival of crime," where men sin 
hilariously, even exhibiting a strange levity in the face -of 
the most solemn and portentous emergencies ; like the Giron- 
dists of the French Revolution, who, doomed to die on the 
morrow, spent the night in banqueting and reveling, rilling 
the air with shout and song and ghastly merry-making, in 
the very shadow of the guillotine. 

It is well that in our day the martial spirit, the thirst 
for military glory, is rapidly abating. No doubt there have 
been just and even holy wars, whose heroes are worthy of 
their fame, yet the most tragic events in history are the cruel 
wars that have stained its pages from the beginning. There 
has certainly been a great advance in public sentiment since 
Abbott wrote his Life of Napoleon, and the recent attempt 
to revive interest in the career of Napoleon Bonaparte was 
a signal failure. The man whose only claim to posthumous 
fame was in the fact that he incarnadined a continent with 
human blood, does not deserve historic immortality. Prob- 
ably our earth never groaned under such excessive arma- 
ments as oppress it to-day, and yet people stand aghast at 
the thought that these great military forces may possibly 
meet in the shock of battle. God grant that these great 
armaments may prove harbingers of a nearing era of univer- 
sal brotherhood and perpetual peace. 

There is a vast deal of unprofitable vain-glorying in the 
world, where men lose sight of the true moral proportion, 
slighting the high and venerable and truly majestic things, 
and exalting and magnifying the inferior and paltry things. 



GlyORYIISG IN THKj IyORD. 



Men glory in themselves ; exulting in their small notoriety, 
boasting of their business thrift, the houses they live in, 
their sumptuous fare, their vain ostentation and foolish dis- 
play; that they are objects of envy and flattery to their in- 
feriors and dependents. All such glorying is vain. 

No doubt there are worthy objects of glorying which 
may not hold the highest eminence. It is sometimes well 
to glory in men — men whose self-denying services to the 
race have laid us under the tribute of grateful and lasting 
remembrance. It is well to glory in the march of civiliza- 
tion, the triumph of freedom, the growth of humane senti- 
ment, the elevation of the masses ; in high scholarship and 
true culture; in the wealth of learning and the spread of 
intelligence; in the progress of scientific discovery, and the 
growing mastery of mind over the material forces. 

It is always ennobling to glory in nature. God made 
this physical world to be studied, and admired, and enjoyed. 
We may not have the poet's genius; we might not be able 
to construct two sentences that would rhyme; yet we may 
have the poet's eye and his passionate love for nature. And 
God has made nature so vast and multiform that no rich 
man can place its treasures under lock and key ; no syndi- 
cate of wealth can monopolize the grandeur and beauty of 
the outer world. The greatest thing in nature is the open 
sky over our heads — the cerulean sky by day and the starlit 
sky by night And any one can see the sky by simply looking 
upwards. The next greatest thing in inanimate nature is a 
full-blown rose ; and the world is full of roses. I have seen 
great banks of roses in the mining towns of the upper 
peninsula of Michigan. The mistress of the humblest cot- 
tage, who keeps a row of flowering plants upon her window 
sill, or trains a rosebush in her narrow dooryard, may gain 
more enjoyment from nature than many a millionaire who 
owns a whole conservatory of costly plants and flowers. 

But let us consider now, more directly, the words of the 



14 GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



apostle: "He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." 
However attractive these words may seem to the truly de- 
vout, they have no magnetism and little meaning to men of 
coarse tastes and worldly inclinations. It is said that the 
celebrated William Pitt was once persuaded to hear White- 
field preach. When he was afterward asked for his impres- 
sion of the sermon, he replied that the preacher was as unin- 
telligible to him as if he had spoken in a foreign tongue. 
How this illustrates those other words of St. Paul, "The 
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, 
for they are foolishness to him, neither can he know them, 
because they are spiritually discerned." The worldly- 
minded are quite willing to resign the heavenly glories to 
the saints and the angels, if they can be secure in the enjoy- 
ments of this life. But within the limits of the worldly and 
the sensual their ambition knows no bounds. The insane 
greed with which they pursue the riches and honors and 
pleasures of this world is proverbial; but they have no 
heart for the riches that cannot be stolen or corrupted; for 
the crown that fadeth not away ; for the pleasures which are 
at God's right hand. 

The trumpeted skepticism of the times is not due to a 
stubborn, logical necessity which compels men to disbelieve ; 
it rather comes from the heart than willingly disbelieves 
unto unrighteousness. On a slender ledge of speculative doubt 
men have raised a huge conspiracy of religious indifference. 
They profane the Sabbath, neglect the Bible, desert the 
churches, deny authority, ignore God, and reject every relig- 
ious sanction of morality; and the painful conviction is 
forced upon us that if it should come to pass at length that 
intelligent people everywhere should concur in declaring 
that every scheme of religion is a vain delusion; that there 
are not even presumptive evidences for the existence of a 
personal and moral God; that conscience is a figment and 
futurity an idle dream ; that virtue has no sanction and 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



15 



vice no penalty ; the great mass of irreligious people would 
welcome such sweeping and deadening infidelity as a grate- 
full relief. 

But it is no easy thing to rid ourselves of our religious 
convictions. We possess a religious nature, and that nature 
is at times profoundly impressible and strongly assertive. 
There are three great facts which go far toward preventing 
men from lapsing into utter religious desuetude. 

First, there is the solemn fact of the brevity and uncer- 
tainty of life. You will recall Ruskin's freak that "life is 
disgustingly short." Too short for pleasure, too short for 
art, too short for our far-reaching plans of worldly profit. 
Amid all the perplexities of our thinking we are certain of 
this, that each one of us is rapidly nearing the end of life's 
journey and will soon disappear forever from the abodes of 
the living. The sword of Damocles o'erhangs every head. 
The arrow that sooner or later will pierce our heart has 
already left the string. Many of our industries are greatly 
depressed, but the breadmaker and the coffinmaker are never 
idle. And none can tell when the fatal blow shall fall. I 
lift my foot from the ground; I know not whether I shall 
replace it in this or the unseen world. 

"Leaves have their time to fall, 

And flowers to wither at the north wind's breath, 
And stars to set; but all — 

Thou hast all seasons for thine own, 
O Death!" 

Again, there is the universal reign of sorrow. The in- 
ventive genius of man has done much to improve the condi- 
tions of living. It has increased our luxuries and multiplied 
our comforts, but it has never discovered an antidote for 
our throbbing griefs, and the gay look is often a thin dis- 
guise for the woes that rankle within. 

Some years ago I was shown with a friend through a 
stately mansion in the interior of England — a courtesy often 



16 



GLORYING IN THE^ LORD. 



shown to traveling strangers. We passed through many 
fine apartments and were ushered at length into the picture 
gallery. We admired the fine paintings, and were about 
passing on, when the attendant suddenly shoved back a 
panel in the wall and revealed a picture whose very hideous- 
ness left a lasting impression on our memory. It was a 
full-size picture of a poor wretch kneeling on the stone floor 
of a dungeon, with manacled hands and disheveled hair, and 
with eyes raised imploringly, but hopelessly, heavenward. 
It was the artist's conception of grim despair. And when- 
ever I recall that visit to the nobleman's palace, the most 
conspicuous of my memories is of that frightful picture 
behind the panel. 

And then, there is the universal consciousness of sin. 
Men have been trying for ages to rid themselves of this 
dark consciousness. They have declared that sin is a non- 
entity, that it is absolutely non-existent. Sometimes they 
have taken the optimistic view, that evil is good under an- 
other name. Of late it has been declared, in sounding 
phrase, that "sin is the full spheral harmony and complete- 
ness of nature's law," but God's word declares that "sin is 
the transgression of the law," not its harmony and complete- 
ness ; and the universal conscience vindicates the truth of 
God's Word. And this consciousness of sin, wherever 
found, gives a dark hint of coming retribution and eternal 
loss. 

The fact has been urged upon our attention, that the doc- 
trine of evolution, which it was confidently expected would 
dispose of the need of a Creator and politely bow God out 
of the universe, has been unexpectedly found to confirm 
several of the fundamental truths of revealed religion. Life, 
we are told, is the outcome of a gradual process of evolu- 
tion from a lower to a higher order, and this is effected 
through a capacity, inherent in things, for choosing their 
proper food and environment, and vanquishing whatever 



GLORY) NG IN THE LORD. 



17 



should stand in the way of their doing so. And so life is an 
incessant struggle ; yet not all forms of life prevail, but only 
the fittest shall survive. 

I pass now into the moral sphere. I behold a bright 
procession of human lives, emerging from the darkness and 
depths of sin into the sunlight and helpfulness of God's 
favor.; placing themselves within God's order, choosing 
their proper food and environment, resisting all adverse in- 
fluences, allying themselves with all goodness, and thus 
mounting upward from grace to grace and glory to glory 
in the pathway of an eternal progress. On the other hand, 
I behold a scattered procession of misguided souls, placing 
themselves .outside of God's order, rejecting their proper 
nourishment, following their evil impulses, allying them- 
selves with all baneful powers, and sinking step by step into 
fathomless depths of infamy and despair. 

Says a fervid preacher: "If you give an astronomer an 
arc of an ellipse he will tell you the whole form and period 
of it, and in how long a time that comet, revolving about the 
sun in a closed orbit, will return ; but if you make the curve 
a slightly different one, he will tell you that the body is fly- 
ing in a mighty hyperbola on which it will never return, an 
unclosed curve that will carry it forever away. And," he 
asks, "does sin move in a closed orbit? Is not its curve the 
awfully out-going sweep of the hyperbola ?" 

It is not surprising that many minds, impressed by 
thoughts like these, can no longer find satisfaction in un- 
qualifield worldliness. Some have drifted away upon the 
bleak moors of pessimism and fatalism. Others are in sus- 
pense. They hear the angel voices calling from the heights 
to a purer and truer faith, but they heed them not. It seems 
to them incredible that beings constituted like ourselves 
should find their ineffable repose and supreme bliss in a 
divine fellowship. The theologian explains this as the natu- 
ral feeling of the unregenerate heart at enmity with God. 



18 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



And no doubt the theologian is correct. Yet may not this 
aversion be partially due to a false conception of God — the 
bugaboo of a distempered fancy ? 

Whenever I recall the glowing words of the apostle, 
there are visioned to my thought three forms or phases of 
the Divine. 

• First, there is visioned a Divine Paragon, 
There are some tendencies, even in this worldly and 
sensual age, which are bright pointers toward a better era. 
There is a manifest tendency and effort toward perfection. 
This is seen even in the commercial and industrial sphere. 
The purchaser of commodities demands the very best for 
his money's worth, the purest, the strongest, the most fin- 
ished brand. The skilled artisan who can produce the per- 
fect fabric gains the highest wage. The mill owner, no 
matter what the cost, displaces the old machinery with the 
newer invention, which promises improved results. 

We observe the same drift within the intellectual sphere. 
What unsparing critics we are becoming! A discord in 
music; how it tortures the sensitive ear. Inferior work in 
art or literature; how it distresses the cultured taste. The 
standards of scholarship have advanced so rapidly that the 
graduate of the village high school to-day has more knowl- 
edge, and in better form, than the university graduate of 
fifty years ago. Within the social sphere we find a kindred 
yearning for a more perfect state. Who of us is satisfied 
with the present social order? The doctrinaires are dream- 
ing of a coming Utopia where poverty shall disappear and 
universal happiness prevail. If we reach now to the tran- 
scendent perfection, perfect character, the interest deepens. 
How we are ringing the changes on that word "character." 
It is the threadbare theme of pulpit discourse. It is the 
favorite topic of the newspaper and magazine writer. It is 
the handy subject of the schoolboy's oration. Flawless 
character! Where will we find it? You have a friend 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



19 



whom you fondly love. You are never weary of dwelling 
upon his virtues. You tell me his character is perfect, 
without defect or stain. I ask, "Do you mean that your 
friend is absolutely perfect?" "Not quite that," you say. 
"Of course, my friend is human." No, we shall not find the 
absolutely perfect in the finite or the human. Would we 
seek that we must reach upward to the infinite and the 
divine. God's character is the only paragon. Shall we not 
then admire him? Shall we not adore him? When I re- 
member that the God whom I adore is not a chill abstrac- 
tion, but a great palpitating heart in the midst of the uni- 
verse ; that he is so great that he stoops to our human little- 
ness and sets his love upon us ; that he gathers us in his 
arms, and dandles us with parental fondness on his knees ; 
that he inspires in us the longing and the hope to be perfect 
in our measure as he is perfect; then my exultant soul 
loathes all inferior glorying, and glories only in the Lord. 

Again, there is visioned to my thought a Divine Man. 

Nineteen centuries ago, in a stall of the humble caravan- 
sary at Bethlehem, was born the most wonderful Babe that 
ever opened its eyes upon this wondering world. We catch 
scant glimpses of his infancy, and afterward a brief glimpse 
of his precocious youth, and then the vision fades until, in 
the ripeness of his early manhood, he emerges from the 
seclusion of Nazareth to become the focused Brightness of 
the ages. Since then the preachers and the poets have been 
extolling him in sermon and in song; but if the hush of 
oblivion should fall upon all that the preachers and poets 
have said about him, there would be left enough, in the 
tributes of unbelievers, to stamp him as the singular charac- 
ter Of all time, who had no fellow and can have no successor. 
What an impress Jesus Christ has left in history ! How his 
"dead" hand has molded the ages ! 

Sometime ago I had a conversation with a young man 
who had spent several years in a German university, and 



20 



GLORYING IN THKJ LORD. 



had become sadly tinctured with German naturalism. In 
the course of our conversation he made the remark that 
it seemed to him unfortunate that the Christian religion was 
so closely identified with a name, ".because," said he, "as 
a matter of course that name will grow dimmer and dimmer 
until at length it will entirely fade out of human thought." 
I assured the young man that his misgivings were ground- 
less. The idea that Jesus Christ is to fade out of human 
thought! There never has been an hour since the advent 
when Jesus Christ was as much thought about and talked 
about and written about as he is to-day. Fade out of human 
thought ! He is simply rising to the zenith of his full-orbed 
glory. He cannot fade out of human thought. 

I divide our globe into two great hemispheres. The one 
is a hemisphere of increasing light; it includes "the intelli- 
gence, the humanity, the enterprise, the eternal hopefulness 
of mankind. The other is in the dark shadow. Within it 
are the congested poverty and ignorance and cruelty and 
despair of the race. What name shall we give to the bright 
hemisphere? It has its name. It is not a Bible name; it 
is not a name used exclusively by Christians ; it is the name 
applied by thinking men of all beliefs. The word v that 
names the bright hemisphere is Christendom. Christ's ex- 
ample and teaching have given to the aggressive and pro- 
gressive world its name. 

I never shall forget my first Sabbath morning in Jerusa- 
lem many years ago. I ascended to the flat roof of the 
house in which I was lodged, to take in the view of the city 
and its surrroundings. Before me in the distance was the 
Mount of Olives. The whole mountain seemed to speak 
of redemption, for its sides were spotted with the brilliant 
red of the Rose of Sharon, as if on its verdant slopes had 
fallen showers of blood. At the foot of the mountain, and 
concealed by the city wall, was the traditional Garden of 
Gethsemane. Within the wall, and in the range of vision, 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



21 



was the modern citadel or barracks, which is supposed to 
occupy the site of Pilate's judgment hall. To my right I 
could see the dome of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, 
the reputed place of the crucifixion and the burial. Right 
beneath where I was standing was a broken column which 
it is supposed was one of the posts of the old gate of the 
"Via Dolorosa," through which our Saviour passed on his 
way from the judgment hall to Golgotha. And then I 
looked upward, and against the deep blue of that glorious 
Syrian sky floated the consular flags of the great Christian 
nations, unfurled in honor of the day. There were the 
eagles of Italy and Austria and Russia, and the tri-colors 
of France and Germany, and the Cross of Saint George, 
and our own starry flag, bearing glad witness that after the 
vicissitudes of nineteen centuries the wealth and learning 
and prowess of the world bowed in homage at the feet of 
the Crucified. But the Christ we adore is not a dead Christ. 
Ours is a living Christ, the triumphant leader of the living 
church. 

And so there is visioned to my thought a divine move- 
ment. This movement is the prophesied kingdom of God. 
And, as in the distant past, so in our day, this kingdom 
cometh not with observation. Men do not cry "Lo ! here," 
or "Lo! there." Multitudes indeed are unaware of its 
existence and its progress. You step on board a railway 
train ; the rumbling of the wheels, the swaying of the car as 
it rounds a curve, the flitting past of the landscape, impress 
you that you are rapidly moving. But what is the speed of 
the swiftest railway train compared with the velocity of our 
earth as it sweeps in its orbit around the sun?. Yet, be- 
cause there is no straining and creaking and jarring, be- 
cause the same constellations will be visible to-night as were 
visible last night, the earth seems stationary. And so the 
kingdom of God seems motionless to many, yet through the 
ages it has been sweeping onward with a resistless and 



22 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



unmeasured progress. And the kingdom of God is gather- 
ing into itself every element of good which the world pos- 
sesses. As on the smelting-hearth the quicksilver separates 
every atom of shining gold from the worthless slag, so out 
of all human elements the kingdom of God separates all that 
is worth preserving, everything that sparkles with the radi- 
ance of the Divine. 

It is the glory of Christian discipleship to identify itself 
with this divine kingdom. Perish all worldly ambitions if. 
you and I may be laborers together with God, if we may be 
components of the heavenly kingdom. 

A friend was describing to me recently a sermon he once 
heard Bishop Simpson preach. That reverend man had 
been in the old world. He had visited some of the renowned 
cities of Italy, and had become greatly interested in the 
triumphs of immortal art. He was especially interested in 
the grand mosaics which adorn the domes of the old cathe- 
drals, where saints and angels, and even God himself, are 
represented as looking down from their lofty galleries upon 
the worshipers beneath. And in his sermon he was de- 
scribing a picture God was making, not for the dome of a 
great cathedral, but to adorn the boundless arch of the 
heavens ; not made of little cubes of painted glass, but com- 
posed of redeemed and glorified human spirits. In the 
midst of his description he suddenly paused and, lifting his 
hands cried, in his own impassioned way, "O God, put me 
into the picture!" And I fancy a thousand hearts re- 
sponded, "put me, also, into the picture." 

I can sympathize with the warm attachment many feel 
for the life that now is. Time has dealt gently with many 
of us. Were it God's will we could wish to live for a thou- 
sand years. This earth, which is our present dwelling place, 
is in many of its aspects a delightful world. We never can 
forget that our earth has felt the impress of sacred feet. 
It has been sanctified by martyr blood. It has been beauti- 



s 



GLORYING IN THE LORD. 



23 



fied by the radiant life of many a saint. It is the wide field 
on which Divine Providence is executing his vast de- 
signs. We shall not remain here long. Some of us are 
nearing the harbor's mouth. Our pilgrimage will soon end. 
But I have sometimes felt the wish that my mansion in 
the Father's house might have two great windows : the front 
window I would have to open toward the throne, and the 
back window to furnish me a wide outlook upon this present 
world; and I would have this world moored close to my 
heaven. 

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy 
Ghost, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, 
world without end. Amen. 





RECEIVING CHRIST. 

BY REV. A. L. T. EWERT, PH.B., M. A. 

Pastor Centenary Methodist Episcopal Church, Jacksonville. 

"He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as 
many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of 
God, even to them that believe on his name." — John 1:11-12. 

John's message was both generic and specific. He sets 
forth Christ's mission as world-wide, yet individual. 

"You know that love 
Will creep in service where it cannot enter," 

yet John sought by his intense love to enter the deeper 
meaning of Christ's life. He succeeded beyond all others, 
and so reveals to us the "secret of His presence." 
To him 

"Christ — the one great word 
Well worth all languages in earth or heaven," 

was ever real and near. He could not mystify that presence 
in any way. He would not. Hence, in our text he tells us 
of the genesis of the Christian life in the simplest form. 
To many this beginning has been obscure. So many forms 
and methods have arisen that this text must seem like a new 
revelation. As the sin-bearer of the- world Christ ap- 
proaches the individual to save him. Hence it Vvas that 
John exclaims, "But as many as recer A him to them gave 
he power to become the sons — children of God." To reject 



24 



RECEIVING CHRIST. 



25 



him would mean an irreparable loss. We sustain one of two 
positions : we have either accepted or rejected the Christ. 

I. 

THE SIN OF REJECTION. 

Ths&t people hesitate is but too apparent. Why they 
delay, is a question they themselves can hardly answer. 
It is not so much an unbelief with them, as an assumed atti- 
tude of indifference. The credentials of Christ are so clear 
and strong that the intelligent mind is quick to assent to the 
historical, but fails ofttimes to accept as a personal, immedi- 
ate, sufficient satisfaction, power and life the Saviour, 
mighty to save. The peace men long for is not to be found 
in the world. The outer will not suffice. 

Says one, "Life is what the heart makes it. There are 
men tossing upon silken couches to whom this whole round 
world is not worth a fillip of the finger; and there are sons 
of toil and mothers of poverty, tossing up their crowing 
babes, to whom it is a question whether the New Jerusalem 
can bring aught sweeter. The kingdom of heaven cometh 
not by observation of man's outward estate. It cannot be 
purchased by silver or gold. Wealth cannot bestow it, and 
misfortune cannot snatch it from us. Grace, broadening, 
deepening, lifting up the man, changes the face of nature ; 
and wherever the loving, believing heart is, there is the 
kingdom." Why not accept such a life ? 

Some reject because they have no feeling. They make 
emotion the criterion of action. Some have no reason at all. 
They seem to the manner born. Some have not thought long 
enough upon the subject. Put all these together and we 
have the diagnosis, that they are not ready ; they want more 
of self-will; that they want more of the world's pleasures; 
that they do not trust God; that the heart is not willing; 
that sin is maintaining control; that the love of the world 
is supreme ; that the pride inherent will not yield ; that fel- 



2G 



RECEIVING CHRIST. 



lowship with darkness still holds, and that no definite, posi- 
tive start is being made to break with the past and begin 
with Christ. To thus withhold in the face of a provision 
ample, full and free, provided by the Almighty, is indeed a 
sin, an insult to the God of our being. How sad that in the 
very presence of the Divine, and the experience of others, 
we hesitate. Hear the words of St. Augustine : "Too late 
I loved Thee, O beauty of ancient days, yet ever new ! And 
lo ! Thou wert within me, and I abroad searching for Thee. 
Thou wert with me, but I was not with Thee." So we read 
in Revelation : "Behold, I stand at the door and knock ; 
if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come 
in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me." 

II. 

THE GAIN OF ACCEPTANCE. 

Longfellow says, in Evangeline : 

"Other hope had she none, nor wish in life, but to follow 
Meekly, with reverent steps, the sacred feet of her Savior." 

Nor can we have aught another hope. The Christian 
life, like any other life, is a sensible one. If I wish an edu- 
cation, I must educate. If I wish to go somewhere, I must 
start. This is the genius of Christianity, that it gives us 
the start and life needed. The philosophy of acceptance is 
in this, that it separates us from the past. The start is 
instantaneous. The life is continuous. This is God's 
method. Human or man-made methods may not be cor- 
rect or essential. The emotional, agonizing periods fre- 
quently seen in revivals may be useful to some, but are not 
essential. The divine command is, "Follow me." And 
again, as in our text, "But as many as received him." To 
receive and to follow is scriptural. It does not depend upon 
an "altar" or an "inquiry room," nor any special form. 
These may be helpful to some, but are not requisite to a 



RECEIVING CHRIST. 



27 



beginning. "By faith are ye saved, and that not of your- 
selves, it is the gift of God." Then must faith be seen in 
works, without which it is lifeless. 

To receive Christ and follow him is to know God's pro- 
« visions and get into harmony with his method. Our perma- 
nent peace can only thus be established. Shakespeare says : 

"How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank ! 
Here will we sit, and let the sounds of music 
Creep in our ears : soft stillness, and the night, 
Become the touches of sweet harmony." 

Without this oneness with the Infinite, one cannot sit 
in reflection with peace and joy ! Our life is too brief to trifle. 
"We pass this way but once," hence the gain of acceptance 
is self-evident. No need of explanation. It is God's spirit 
to be liberal. Without stint does he give us sunshine and 
shade, rain and growth, seedtime and harvests. Without 
a worthiness on our part he continues this marvelous pro- 
vision year by year. So in the economy of grace God freely 
forgives his erring children, if they come to him and accept 
the provision made. 

In our sins we perish. Under sentence we are doomed, 
unless we come under the protection . of grace. As a heart 
and volitional act we must meet God's conditions. Then 
may we go forth in the strength and power of a new pur- 
pose and ideal to serve the Lord our God. To receive Christ 
means a new life. 

III. 

THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE TEXT. 

Having seen the conditions entering into the previous 
considerations, we approach more minutely the text as a 
whole. A few things said may be renewedly emphasized. 
We have come to a point where we need to adjust ourselves 
to a very definite setting forth of the truth. Christianity is 



28 RECEIVING CHRIST. 

more and more assuming the practical aspect of life. While 
it is not solely ethical, yet ethics must prevail. It must be 
witnessed in our dealings one with another in every-day 
life. Christianity is not a Sunday garment, but a life of 
seven days in the week. It cannot be without prayer, but 
prayer is not the all of it. It must express itself in hymns, 
but singing beautiful chants and sacred songs is not the all 
of it. It must or may express itself in ritualism, but this 
is far from being the all of Christianity. It must or may 
be seen in fine churches, but its mission is to grace the cot- 
tage or log cabin. It came to console, comfort, strengthen, 
animate, make anew, give hope, and reach beyond the tomb. 
It helps us to live and then to die. 

Young says : "Men may live fools, but fools they cannot 
die." The rich man heard the voice, "Thou fool, this night 
thy soul shall be required of thee." This was not because 
he was rich, but because he was a foolish rich man. So a 
poor person may be very foolish. Christ came to make us 
wise unto salvation. This is the burden of John's gospel. 
Nowhere is it more simplified than in our text. 

Two classes are clearly noted, two states of being. That 
through the mediation of Christ a call is made. A setting 
forth of God's love and the entreaty. Some rejected. "He 
came unto his own, but his own received him not. But as 
many as received him, to them gave he power to become the 
sons — children — of God." Here, then, is the practical in- 
terpretation of a theme around which theologians have bat- 
tled for centuries. 

We thank God for the brighter day wherein we see more 
clearly the will of God in this matter. It means that allegi- 
ance to God is first personal. 

Evil and the good are in opposition. To exalt one means 
the weakening of the other. The kingdoms thus arise, the 
kingdom of God and that of Satan. The one leads to a 
recovery of self and happy alliance; the other to evil and 



RECEIVING CHRIST. 



29 



ruin. To be in the kingdom of sin is to deaden the finer 
sensibilities and harden the heart. However sin may be 
attired, wherever found it is always the same as to results. 
It courses through temper, pleasure, desire for gains, or 
self-will until it consummates itself in destruction. This is 
illustrated every day. The victims of sin are heard every- 
where. Behind prison bars is not the only place to see the 
fruits of sin. Shakespeare says of sin : 

"One sin, I know, another doth provoke ; 
Murder's as near to lust as flame to smoke." 

Another writer says : 

"There is a method in man's wickedness ; 
It grows up by degrees." 

The Bible says : "The wages of sin is death." 

Now this represents a kingdom. Men are in it until 
they are out of it. It is a kingdom of graded conditions. 
Some who are in it are not as wicked as others. Some even 
fight against the temptation to go deeper into sin. Some are 
so unconsciously influenced by Christianity that they even 
admire and love the things of Christ, yet remain where they 
are, associated with the various members directly and indi- 
rectly, because within the domain of the kingdom. If this 
is realized, the question at once must come, How can I 
transfer from this kingdom into the kingdom of Christ? 
"But as many as received him." Here is the transference, 
simple but complete. There is no need of prolongation of 
any process of outer struggle. The question is, have I ac- 
cepted the provision, and do I from the very present promise 
to go forth in the new 1 kingdom ? This may melt the heart. 
It may produce emotion when we take in the love of God, 
and the guilt of sin. It may be a quiet, calm, deliberate 
step, which is enough if now you continue. A young lady 



RECEIVING CHRIST*. 



began thus in my meetings a year ago. She was greatly 
troubled. She wanted feelings — emotions like others she 
had heard testify. This, however, did not come. She never- 
theless joined the church and kept on. This year, in meet- 
ing, she exhorted others to not doubt about feelings expected 
and not realized. "Go forward," said she, "and serve 
Christ, and the heart will be filled with peace and joy." 

Thus in receiving Christ as the text indicates, is a 
turning Godward, a transference of kingdoms, and a joyful 
continuance will initiate a life that forever will be a bene- 
diction and a blessing. 

It was perhaps with a sens*e of this delight that Charles 
Wesley wrote : 

"Raised by the breath of love divine, 
We urge our way with strength renewed ; 
The church of the lirst-born to join, 
We travel to the mount of God ; 
With joy upon our heads arise, 
And meet our Savior in the skies. 

Here we have fellowship, conduct, anticipation. These 
belong to the new kingdom. We have fellowship in a new 
enterprise and work; we have conduct as an evidence of 
renewing grace ; and a hope for things to come. With such 
a diagnosis of sin on the one hand, and an adequate Christ 
on the other, it would seem that the people would hastily 
decide to leave the old abode of sin and turn toward the new 
life and him. As 

"A sculptor wields 
The chisel, and the stricken marble grows 
To beauty," 

so in coming to this new beginning, it is that we may live 
and grow in Christ, to beauty and usefulness. 

We live in God's outer world. It is full of grandeur and 
utility. A thousand wonders arise daily. We are reminded 



RECEIVING CHRIST. 3i 

of the inexhaustibility of this great storehouse. How liber- 
ally God gives. How kindly he continues to give. Would 
it not be cruel to ignore the giver? Oh, fall upon your 
knees in adoration and thanksgiving ! Let your appreciation 
concrete itself in deeds. Then Shall your life beautify itself 
for eternity, as well as to radiate blessings upon others as 
you go. 

In leaving the old kingdom of sin we are generally ex- 
horted that it must be because of much repentance and sor- 
rows for sin, a pungent conviction, and many other things. 
I wish, however, to say that the great consideration is the 
actual departure from sin, and the entrance into Christ's 
kingdom. Whatever the motive may be, do not allow any 
side issue to deter you. If you have no great repentance, 
have you fear? You may leave the old ranks because of 
fear. It is not the highest motive, but it is a motive, and- 
will lead to something better if only it causes action. Let 
the fear of death and judgment lead you to Christ. Do 
you like bad companions? Then think of the associates in 
the kingdom of sin, and flee that you may become associated 
with Christ and his followers. You will then rise to a truer 
estimate of redemption and adoption. Various churches 
have different methods. Much stress is placed by these 
upon their respective essentials. That may be well enough, 
but let none of them hinder you from a simple, direct com- 
ing to the Lord. There may be outer signs of an inward 
grace, but be sure to make more of the inward grace than 
the outer forms. When God speaks, listen! He informs us 
now by his word that we have violated his law. This we 
but too truly know, and hence readily agree with the rest 
that we are "all guilty before God." In our sins we are 
not qualified for heaven. In going to prepare' the "many 
mansions" he first came to prepare us. Hence, our prepa- 
ration for heaven begins with — "But as many as received 
him." 



:J0 



RECEIVING CHRIST. 



began thus in my meetings a year ago. She was greatly 
troubled. She wanted feelings — emotions like others she 
had heard testify. This, however, did not come. She never- 
theless joined the church and kept on. This year, in meet- 
ing, she exhorted others to not doubt about feelings expected 
and not realized. "Go forward," said she, "and serve 
Christ, and the heart will be filled with peace and joy." 

Thus in receiving Christ as the text indicates, is a 
turning Godward, a transference of kingdoms, and a joyful 
continuance will initiate a life that forever will be a bene- 
diction and a blessing. 

It was perhaps with a sense of this delight that Charles 
Wesley wrote : 

"Raised by the breath of love divine, 
We urge our way with strength renewed ; 
The church of the first-born to join, 
We travel to the mount of God ; 
With joy upon our heads arise, 
And meet our Savior in the skies. 

Here we have fellowship, conduct, anticipation. These 
belong to the new kingdom. We have fellowship in a new 
enterprise and work; we have conduct as an evidence of 
, renewing grace ; and a hope for things to come. With such 
a diagnosis of sin on the one hand, and an adequate Christ 
on the other, it would seem that the people would hastily 
decide to leave the old abode of sin and turn toward the new 
life and him. As 

I 

"A sculptor wields 
The chisel, and the stricken marble grows 
To beauty," 

so in coming to this new beginning, it is that we may live 
and grow in Christ, to beauty and usefulness. 

We live in God's outer world. It is full of grandeur and 
utility. A thousand wonders arise daily. We are reminded 



RECEIVING CHRIST. 31 

of the inexhaustibility of this great storehouse. How liber- 
ally God gives. How kindly he continues to give. Would 
it not be cruel to ignore the giver? Oh, fall upon your 
knees in adoration and thanksgiving ! Let your appreciation 
concrete itself in deeds. Then Shall your life beautify itself 
for eternity, as well as to radiate blessings upon others as 
you go. 

In leaving the old kingdom of sin we are generally ex- 
horted that it must be because of much repentance and sor- 
rows for sin, a pungent conviction, and many other things. 
I wish, however, to say that the great consideration is the 
actual departure from sin, and the entrance into Christ's 
kingdom. Whatever the motive may be, do not allow any 
side issue to deter you. If you have no great repentance, 
have you fear? You may leave the old ranks because of 
fear. It is not the highest motive, but it is a motive, and- 
will lead to something better if only it causes action. Let 
the fear of death and judgment lead you to Christ. Do 
you like bad companions? Then think of the associates in 
the kingdom of sin, and flee that you may become associated 
with Christ and his followers. You will then rise to a truer 
estimate of redemption and adoption. Various churches 
have different methods. Much stress is placed by these 
upon their respective essentials. That may be well enough, 
but let none of them hinder you from a simple, direct com- 
ing to the Lord. There may be outer signs of an inward 
grace, but be sure to make more of the inward grace than 
the outer forms. When God speaks, listen! He informs us 
now by his word that we have violated his law. This we 
but too truly know, and hence readily agree with the rest 
that we are "all guilty before God." In our sins we are 
not qualified for heaven. In going to prepare' the "many 
mansions" he first came to prepare us. Hence, our prepa- 
ration for heaven begins with — "But as many as received 
him." 



32 



RECEIVING CHRIST. 



If a physician should die in making a correct diagnosis 
of a disease, and leave a sure remedy; then if we all took 
that disease and could be cured in no other way, would it 
not follow that he died for all, and that each one would have 
to personally receive and take the remedy in order to live? 
This is the picture of Christ, sin, and you. In this way is 
he related to you as a Saviour. By our choice, be it at the 
altar or chair; in the inquiry room, on the street, in the 
field, at the bench, in the store, anywhere, you can approach 
and receive the Christ as a personal gift of God. Let this 
message go forth. Let the children be early brought to 
the Christ. It is a sad business to allow the children to first 
go in the way of sin, and then try, through revival effort, 
to win them back in order that they may know what they 
are doing and have an experience to tell. What a delusion ! 
"Let the children receive Christ. "Suffer the little children 
to come unto me and forbid them not, for of such is the 
kingdom of heaven." Vain folly to be wise above the 
Maker. 

Milton, years ago, said : 

"The childhood shows the man 
As morning shows the day." : 

The hope of the future church must largely be found in 
the childhood of to-day. 

A FINAL WORD. 

Tennyson wrote : 

"Men may rise on stepping stones 
Of their dead selves to higher things." 

We are sure this century is higher than any of the past. 
So Christianity is advancing to a higher view of what the 
church should be and do. The old self of yesterday may 
well die for the new life of tomorrow. The stepping is to 
be done now. In our text we are to receive Christ because 
the higher must lift up the lower. 



RECEIVING CHRIST. 



33 



Further, the Christ is life and character. Paul says: 
"If any man have not the spirit of Christ, he is none of 
his." In receiving Christ we receive the ideal — the type 
to which we belong. Let that ideal, the objective, become 
subjective, working in us and through us the essentials 
necessary for the largest and most useful life; blessed now 
and blessed beyond. This will beget within us an affinity 
for heaven. Receiving Christ will mean heaven begun and 
continued until we shall enter heaven with a heavenly prepa- 
ration. That is the exact schooling we all need. To re- 
ceive Christ is to be identified with him. His purposes are 
extensive. The apostolic school has grown. All his disci- 
ples are numbered in the army of workers. 

First, the work in us : taking off the rough edges, con- 
forming the will to his, making the disposition lovable and 
the character strong. Then, secondly, the work through us : 
influencing others consciously and unconsciously, making 
our lives a benediction by doing the best possible in our 
sphere. Thus will the essence of the gospel be fulfilled in 
us. The life of true value and excellence will undoubtedly 
call for denials and effort. It is the life of no importance 
that simply drifts with the crowd or tide. To receive Christ 
is to get an inspiration that will inspire and quicken the 
upward trend. Oh, for a deepening of this work of grace ! 
The Christian life pays all along the way. It is really all 
gain and no loss. It dispenses with the worthless and in- 
ferior, and seeks to assimilate the good, pure and helpful. 
Above the vacillating, passing and glitter will shine with 
splendor undimmed the luster of a noble life begotten in 
Christ. 

"Here is my heart, my God, I give it thee ; 

I heard thee call and say — 
Not unto the world, my child, but unto me, 

I heard and will obey ; 
Here is love's offering to my king, 
Which in glad sacrifice I bring, 

Here is my heart." 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



BY REV. WM. T. BEADLES. 

Presiding Elder Quincy District. 

"I have overcome the world." — John 16:33. 
"For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world; and this is 
the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith." — I. John 5 14. 

In a little upper room in the city of Jerusalem, nearly 
nineteen hundred years ago, a few men were gathered to- 
gether. They were thirteen in number. I need go no fur- 
ther in the description of the scene; you are all familiar 
with it. Poets and artists have lent their aid to the historian 
to render it immortal. Even superstition bears witness to 
this gathering, and insists that the number is at all times 
and in all places unlucky. It is the closing night of the 
earth life of Jesus Christ; tomorrow he is to be lifted up, 
to die, and though after he rises he will remain a short 
time on the earth, he will no longer be subject to the condi- 
tions that mortals must endure; no hunger, no tears, no 
pain, "after that he has risen." We have visited, by faith, 
this room many times ; let us enter it now and listen to his 
voice for we shall hear the tenderest words that ever fell 
from the lips of him who spake "as never man spake." The 
supper is finished, the traitor has gone out, I think, before 
the Master held that last heart to heart conversation with his 
disciples. These words to which we are listening, we shall 
need all through life. We need them when we enter any 
home into which sorrow has come. Who would try to com- 
fort the mourner without them? "Let not your heart be 
troubled : ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my 



34 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



85 



Father's house are many mansions : if it were not so, I would 
have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I 
go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive 
you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." 
"Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father 
in me? The words that I speak unto you I speak not of 
myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the 
works. Believe me, that I am in the Father, and the Father 
in me : or else believe me for the very works' sake. Verily, 
verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works 
that I do shall he do also ; and greater works than these shall 
he do; because I go unto my Father." "Peace I leave with 
you, my peace I give unto you : not as the world giveth, give 
I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it 
be afraid." 

It is vain to try to select from this wonderful conversa- 
tion, words that will give us the true idea of its wondrous 
power and beauty; we must hear all; and then listen with 
bowed head to the prayer, and join if we may in the hymn, 
before going out into the darkness, the sin, the sadness that 
is to follow. 

Did you ever ask yourself, how this wonderful conversa- 
tion was preserved in its entirety for us? There were no 
stenographers present. And yet who that has read it doubts 
but that every word uttered is preserved. Seated close by 
the Saviour, leaning on his breast, was John the beloved 
disciple, then a young man ; and every syllable that fell from 
the lips of the Master was, by the Holy Spirit, indelibly im- 
pressed upon his memory, so that years after, years that 
had seen most of his companions of that night give up 
their lives because of the truths they had published to the 
world, he writes them down for the comfort and encourage- 
ment of the church of all lands and ages. We desire to-day 
to gather from the closing words of this marvelous "Man 
of sorrows" some thought that will help us in the conflict. 



36 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



of which they tell us, some comfort in the sorrows which 
they felt, and of which we, too, are partakers. Hear them : 
"These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might 
have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation; but be 
of good cheer. / have overcome the world! 3 

These are strange words, if listened to "with merely 
human ears." In a few hours the speaker is to be dragged 
from place to place by the rabble, buffeted, spit upon, 
mocked, scourged, and crucified. What world had he over- 
come? Not the political world. The intrigues of the Ro- 
man politicians were going on without interruption, so far 
as this despised Rabbi was concerned. Not the social world. 
Its revelry and rioting had received no perceptible check. 
Not the commercial world; could the overturning of the 
tables of a few money changers be called a victory? Was 
the world of art, of literature, of music, aye, even of reli- 
gion, overcome? Not at that hour; his life and marvelous 
works seemed to have scarce touched any of these. 

But the words were none the less true ; he had overcome 
the world. He had entered into the world of corruption and 
injected into it the germs of purity, that should conquer the 
corruption. He had entered a world black with hopeless 
darkness, and lighted a torch of eternal hope. He had come 
to a world of sorrow, and brought with him an ineffable 
joy; he had brought with him a love strong enough to 
overcome the hatred that cursed mankind. The beloved 
disciple who heard and recorded the declaration — "I have 
overcome the world" — years after, in his letter to the 
churches, tells us what world Christ has conquered. 1st 
John 2-16, "For all that is in the world, the lust of the 
flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not 
of the Father but is of the world." Here we have the 
world trinity that opposes God, the world that Jesus Christ 
had overcome. 

He had met the prince of this world and had overcome 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



37 



him. It was a memorable conflict that occurred after his bap- 
tism, when "he was led by the Spirit into the wilderness 
to be tempted of the Devil." We remember the first on- 
slaught, the forces of "the lust of the flesh" assailed him; 
he was hungry; for forty days no food had passed his lips. 
"If thou be the Son of God command that these stones be 
made bread." The lust of the flesh? Yes, he was the Son 
of God, but he was man, The Man, and to retain his 
sonship he must overcome the "lust of the flesh" that 
had conquered our first parents, and left them bruised 
and helpless. Must not a man . have bread ? Not neces- 
sarily; he must overcome the lust of the flesh, he must 
"live on every word that proceedeth out of the mouth 
of God," if the divine is to be retained within him. 
What multitudes are overcome by the lust of the flesh ! 
We must have bread, is the plea of thousands that engage 
in a business that curses mankind. We must have bread, 
is the excuse for breaking almost every command of the 
moral law, but Christ suffered hunger, overcame and 
retained his sonship. "Then the Devil taketh him into 
an exceeding high mountain, and showeth him all the 
kingdoms of this world and the glory of them" ; the 
legions of the lust of the eyes are now upon him, but he 
overcame. Millions have gone down in defeat before this 
temptation; it appeals to every instinct in humanity that 
urges us to seek honor, glory, wealth, power. All these 
are to be gained, but lawfully. Thanks be to the Son, he 
overcame, and made it possible for us to overcome. Again 
from the pinnacle of the temple, he would have him assert 
arrogantly his Divine power; he even quotes the scriptures, 
as if to say, "if you do not this thing you are afraid to trust 
your Father." The pride of life, the temptation to be pre- 
sumptuous, I am a child of God, hence I may do this thing, 
I may court this temptation, I may risk this allurement, I 
shall not be overcome. Is it not wonderful that John, who, 



♦ 



38 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



in his gospel makes no allusion to the temptation, should be 
the one of all the evangelists to thus epitomize them years 
after, and after he has told us what this world was that 
Christ had overcome, he tells us the blessed truth, strengthens 
us with ,the blessed assurance that "Whatsoever is born of 
God overcometh the world ; and this is the victory that over- 
cometh the world, even our faith." This comes down the 
ages to us like the clarion call of the bugle. There is a con- 
flict. It began in Eden, and the World was victor. In the 
providence of God the battle is on. The whole history of 
the race is a history of conflict, of battle, defeat, 1 victory. 
This is literally true so far as written history is concerned. 
I have in my library, in several volumes, a history of the 
world. Take out of it all that relates to war, carnage, the 
struggle of nation against nation, and all the balance can 
be put in one volume, all that t relates to art, science, the 
progress of literature, everything is but of minor importance, 
or else is capable of being written with less detail, and war, 
conflict, struggle, fills the pages. This struggle between 
nations is not all that reminds us that we live in a world 
where force meets force, and the struggle for the mastery is 
constantly going on. The morning advances, its army sends 
forward its gray scouts followed by its golden columns, and 
drives back the dark regiments of the night, only in turn to 
be driven again by them. The sun shoots its golden javelins 
into the face of the north wind, and puts him to flight, only 
to have him return again and renew the conflict ; thus victory 
and defeat has alternated ever since creation's morn. I stood 
one day on the rocky shore of the ocean ; a gale was blowing 
toward the land ; the great waves, like white helmeted regi- 
ments, charged against the rocky fortress of the coast, only 
to be hurled back in confusion. I thought, this, then, has 
been going on ever since He said : "Hitherto shalt thou 
come and no further, and here shall thy proud waves be 
stayed." But the history of the real conflicts have not been 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



39 



written. The struggle for the victory of the soul, over the 
world within man, this is the. real conflict, and the Master 
assures us that "in him we shall have peace." That he has 
"overcome the world." And the beloved disciple tells us that 
the "victory that overcometh is faith." Faith, wondrous 
word, wondrous power — what is it? Like every great force 
it is invisible. What it does can be seen ; what it is can only 
be judged by what it does. I boarded a train one day, and 
was taken rapidly across the broad prairies of Illinois : night 
came on and I sought my berth and slept. In the morning 
no prairies were to be seen, we were in the mountains of 
Arkansas; another day and night and we are sweeping 
across the broad plains of Texas; another day and night, 
more mountains; and then the arid plains of Arizona, and 
the desolation of the saltine desert. We retired early that 
night ; all was so desolate we would forget it ; we woke next 
morning in the land of flowers and gold. But little more than 
half a week had elapsed since we had left the snow, the sleet, 
the north wind; hundreds, thousands of miles have been 
traversed; we have seen the splendid engines, have noted 
the elegant cars in which we traveled, but we have not seen 
the power that has transported us so swiftly to this earthly 
paradise, and we shall never see it, it is invisible,. I desired 
one day to speak with my friend. He was two hundred 
miles away, .but I called him and he answered me. I knew 
it was the voice of my friend, but I did not see the strange, 
subtle power that carried my voice to my friend and his to 
me; I shall never see it; it is real, but unseen. So, too, one 
day, by faith, I stood and around me was impenetrable 
darkness ; I listened and a voice spake — "Let there be light," 
and lo the eternal fingers pushed back the darkness, and I 
saw — Chaos, emptiness; I looked again and the firmament 
appeared at his command, and the waters were gathered 
together, the dry land appeared, vegetation sprang up, the 
sun's golden rays burst through the v mists ; the birds flew 



40 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



through the air, and twittered in the branches of the trees ; 
the beast of the forest appeared, and the fishes swam in the 
waters ; I was there, by faith, when this was done ; "By 
faith I understand that the worlds were framed by the word 
of God, so that things that are seen were not made of things 
which do appear." Do you tell me that ages were consumed 
in the consummation of these things ? I care not ; by faith I 
am immortal. 

I stood one day, by faith, at the base of a mountain; its 
top was hidden by a great cloud and the lightnings were 
flashing across it in zigzag lines; the thunder's peal after 
peal seemed to shake the mountain to its center. Around me 
were a vast multitude of pale-faced, shuddering men, women 
and children. Above the cloud was Moses, the man of God, 
receiving from the eternal hands the tables of stone on 
which God's finger had written the law that was to govern 
his people. Once more, by faith, I stand on another mount ; 
a cross is planted there, and on the cross a bleeding victim 
hangs. By faith I have followed him from the little upper 
room to the garden ; I have seen the mob as it closed round 
him ; I have followed him to the judgment hall ; I have wit- 
nessed every act in the terrible tragedy that is now reaching 
its fearful culmination; I hear the prayer, "Father, forgive 
them, for they know not what they do;" I hear him cry, 
"It is finished." He is dead. But this is not all, I am in 
the Garden when the angel rolls back the stone and I see 
him come forth ; I am in the room with the disciples when 
suddenly Jesus appears in their midst and speaks to 
Thomas : "Reach hither thy finger and put it into the prints 1 
of the nails in my hands, and thrust thy hand into my side, 
and be not faithless but believing." I am with them when 
they go out to the mount and he tells them, "Ye shall re- 
ceive power after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you, 
and ye shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, and 
in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



41 



of the earth." I watch with them the ascending form till 
it is hidden from view ; I still gaze upward till suddenly, two 
men in white apparel stand by us ; I hear them say, "Ye men 
of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven ? This same 
Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so 
come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven." 
Tell me: if I have this faith, can the world overcome me? 
I believe, and believing have life. This faith is faith in a 
personal, an eternal Saviour, a Captain of salvation that has 
never been defeated. Among his last words were "Lo, I 
am with you even to the end of the world." I believe he is 
with them that trust him. It is only when we doubt that 
failure is possible. I was never in the army of my country. 
I have never been on a battlefield when the battle was raging, 
but I have heard old soldiers say that faith in the command- 
ing general meant everything. I have read of that terrible 
day when the Union forces were driven backward by the 
confederates, when the retreat became a panic, and the men 
were rushing pell-mell, each seeking personal safety. Sheri- 
dan, who had heard of the disaster, mounted his horse, and 
as he met the first stragglers, drew his sword, crying, "Face 
the other way, boys ; face the other way." The fleeing men 
halted, faced about, and soon the defeated men were form- 
ing for victory. Faith in their leader worked the mighty 
miracle, and gained the victory. 

Have men this faith which gives victory over the world 
now? That the apostles and fathers and martyrs of days 
gone by had it is beyond doubt. When Luther stood before 
the diet at Worms, alone, over against him a corrupt church 
that is almost omnipotent, as we hear him say, "Here I 
stand. I can do no other, God help me — Amen," we have 
no doubt that he possessed a power that has delivered him 
from the world. Whence came that power? We remem- 
ber his long struggle with himself and his corrupt surround- 
ings. We recall the mortifications of the flesh, the penances, 



42 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



which culminated when, at Rome, he was wearily climbing, 
on his knees, Pilate's stairway ; and there came to him these 
words of inspiration, "The just shall live by faith." We 
know that from that hour he was transformed into a con- 
queror. Faith. Mighty faith ! Victorious faith, from that 
hour, was to be the motive power that would control his 
life and bring about the great reformation that shall culmi- 
nate in complete victory. 

We, who, under God, are the spiritual sons of Wesley, 
cannot forget the struggles of that earnest man, the spiritual 
conflicts through which he passed, the defeats he suffered, 
until that evening — Wednesday, the 24th of May, 1738, 
— when he says : "I went very unwillingly to a society in 
Aldersgate street, where one was reading Luther's preface 
to the Epistle to the Romans. About a quarter before nine, 
while he was describing the change which God works in the 
heart through faith in Christ, I felt my heart strangely 
warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ alone, for salvation; 
and an assurance was given me that he had taken away my 
sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death. 

"I began to pray with all my might for those who had, in 
a more especial manner, despitefully used me and perse- 
cuted me. I then testified openly to all there, what I now 
first felt in my heart. But it was not long before the enemy 
suggested 'This cannot be faith : for where is thy joy?' Then 
I was taught that peace and victory over sin are 
essential to faith in the Captain of our salvation, but as to 
the transports of joy that usually attend the beginning of it, 
especially to those who have mourned deeply, God some- 
times giveth, sometimes withholdeth them, according to the 
counsels of his own will." Who that reads these words can 
for a moment doubt that Luther and Wesley were conscious 
of victory over the world? Conscious that through faith 
they were conquerors. Has the church left these land- 
marks? Are we to turn aside to something else to give us 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



43 



victory over the world? Or is faith, living faith, in the 
crucified and risen Lord, to still inspire us, till not only shall 
the world within us but the world without us, be overcome ? 
This outside world is not able to see our faith, but it can see 
the results of it, and it will acknowledge its excellence, nay, 
must wherever such excellence is manifested. There are no 
new problems to be solved by those who are followers of the 
Master, since he told them, "I have overcome the world," 
and there are no new forces, by which the world is to be 
overcome. The man who believes is the conqueror. When 
I ascend to the heights to which faith leads me, I not only 
am able to see the eternity of the past, but the eternity of the 
future is spread out before me. When I gaze with John 
on those who have "gone up through much tribulation, and 
who have washed their robes and made them white in the 
blood of the Lamb ;" when I behold "the great white throne 
and him who sits thereon" and remember that he was "a man 
of sorrows and acquainted with grief" — remember that he 
said "He that overcometh will I grant to sit with me on my 
throne, even as I also overcame and am set down with my 
Father on his throne" — though I may not know what power 
and grandeur these words imply ; if I believe they are spoken 
to me, and are true, what sorrow, or grief can gain the vic- 
tory over me? When the struggle with fleshly appetites 
presses me sorely, I shall never be defeated so long as I 
remember that he has said, "To him that overcometh, will 
I give to eat of the hidden manna ;" and "of the tree of life 
that is in the paradise of God." To the believing poor, to 
whom is denied in this life even the barest necessities, what 
a stronghold of defense is this, "To him that overcometh, 
the same shall be clothed in white raiment: and I will not 
blot his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his 
name before my Father and before his angels." They have 
been, and are, unknown. The temptations which have as- 
sailed them are many and strong. The battles they have 



44 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



fought have not been recorded by the pen of the historian. 
The victories they have won have not been the theme of the 
poet, or immortalized by the brush of the painter, but with 
an unfaltering faith, they have fought and overcome, and 
their names are recorded, ready to be revealed when the 
Father shall acknowledge their unsullied glory, their heav- 
enly citizenship, their eternal sonship. Do you say it is an 
element of weakness, to thus look forward to the crowning 
day ? I may be wrong when I say that without such a pros- 
pect before it the soul stands helpless before the world. I 
know that ''respect to the recompense of the reward" has 
proved the sheet anchor of many a storm-tossed soul. If 
"The Author and perfecter of our faith" himself needed 
"the joy set before him" to enable him to "endure the cross, 
and despise the shame," much more we, in our conflict, 
must have our joy, our reward set before us. And this joy is 
before the one who by Divine Grace is able to say, "I- be- 
lieve." We do not charge with weakness the toiler, who 
when his strength falters, places before his mind's eye the 
happy home, the smile of his wife, the prattle of his children, 
in order that he may have strength and courage to complete 
the labors of the day. It is this for which he is toiling. 
Take from him the incentives that urge him forward, and if 
he labors at all his labor is that of a slave. It is faith in the 
future and what it will bring as a reward that prompts the 
hearts of men to risk fortune or health or even life in the 
pursuit of a given purpose. It was faith in the existence of 
land beyond the waters of the unknown western ocean, that 
gave to Columbus the courage to endure the hardships, the 
self denial, that were forced upon him till at length he over- 
came, and made his name immortal. If faith wins victory 
for the merchant, the toiler, the discoverer, why should the 
Christian falter in his contest against the powers that seek- 
to rob the soul of its birthright. This is the victory — have 
we among us those "who have overcome the world"? I 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



45 



know a young lady, one who has loving parents, a happy 
home, in which are to be found the refinements, and adorn- 
ments that make it doubly dear to her. She has been reared 
tenderly, and has those graces that would command admira- 
tion in any refined company. I saw her as she sat holding 
the hand of a little waif who had been sent to the Home and 
School; the little fellow was "nothing to her" the world 
would say. Yet they told me that she had sat by that bed 
night after night, caring for the little sufferer, for Christ's 
sake, without hope of what the world would call reward. 
No mother or sister ever was more devoted than she. Tell 
me, has she not overcome the world ? Can fortune, fashion, 
fame, draw her from that bedside ? No ; filled with that 
same Spirit that was in the Master "she has overcome the 
world." Where is thy faith ? Is it in the omnipotent power 
and mercy of God outside of your soul, or is it in the in- 
dwelling of that Spirit within you which causes you with 
Paul to cry out, "I can do all things through Christ which 
strengtheneth me"? It is well to sing, but not too long, 

"Oh, to be nothing, nothing, 

Only to lie at his feet; 
A broken and empty vessel 

For the Master's use made meet." 

It will not do the world without us any good to lie "broken 
and emptied at his feet," and I do not believe that he wants 
us to lie thus. We have had too much of this kind of salva- 
tion that receives everything and does nothing. It is a false 
humility born of a lack of faith that is ever singing thus. Far 
better is it to exercise that faith which God has given us, till 
we can sing: 

"Stand up, stand up for Jesus, 

Ye soldiers of the cross; 
Lift high his royal banner: 
It must not suffer loss; 



40 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



From victory unto victory 

His army shall he lead 
Till every foe is vanquished 

And Christ is Lord indeed. 
Stand up, stand up for Jesus, 

The strife will not be long, 
This day the noise of battle, 

The next the victor's song; 
To him that overcometh 

A crown of life shall be. 
He with the King of glory ' 

Shall reign eternally." 

Would you have this faith which overcomes the world? 
Then study carefully what victories it has secured for those 
who exercised it in the past. Study prayerfully the splendid 
promises, that its Author and perfecter has given to those 
who have enlisted in his service. When you have found 
what these promises are, "venture on them." Exercise the 
faith you have and it will increase. Faith is the gift of God : 
so is bodily strength, and he who would grow stronger must 
exercise the strength he has. It is as useless to repeat "Lord, 
increase my faith," as it is to pray the Lord increase my 
muscular strength, without exercising that which we already 
possess. I believe. What power can prevail against Him 
that believeth? Oh, ye fearful ones, read once again the 
eleventh chapter of Hebrews. Go again to the little upper 
room and listen while he speaks. "Verily, verily I say unto 
you, he that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he 
do also, and greater works than these shall he do, because I 
go unto my Father." "I have overcome the world." So far as 
he is concerned the conflict is ended. From henceforth he 
sits, expecting until "his enemies shall have become his foot- 
stool." So far as we are concerned, the conflict is on and 
we are victor, or vanquished. Victor if we have that faith 
that works by love and purifies the heart. Vanquished if we 
refuse to exercise it and find the world still struggling with 



THE VICTORY OF FAITH. 



47 



us and often overcoming us. "By faith we stand, by faith 
we have peace with God, by faith we have access to this 
grace wherein we stand." As we glance backward and see 
the triumphs of faith in the past, as we look round us and 
see the men and women who by that same spirit that was in 
Christ have overcome the world, within them, and are fast 
bringing to the feet of Jesus the world around them shall we 
falter, or fail to remember that their God is our God, the 
power that God has given them to do their work, he will 
give us to do ours, can we falter? 

And finally, as we by faith realize that those old heroes 
of the past are watching the conflict, and above all that 
Jesus the Captain of our salvation knows that if we endure 
to the end, we shall be crowned victor, is there one among 
us who is not ready to say with Paul, "None of these things 
move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that 
I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry which 
I have received, of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of 
the grace of God"? 



A NEEDED EXHORTATION. 

BY REV. EZRA J. DURHAM, 

Pastor at Macon. 

"That they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all 
things." — Titus 2:10. 

To set up Christianity as a client and defend it, or to 
argue for the authenticity and integrity of holy writ, are 
both very much like lighting a candle, and by its feeble light 
searching for the sun at noonday. Especially is this true 
in a Christian land, where most of the people recognize the 
genuineness of the Christian Revelation, though they do not 
obey its sacred truths. For this revelation is accepted by all 
the best of humanity as containing the only perfect code of 
morals and rule of life extant. Its statements alone reveal 
to man his real condition, the source from which aid can 
come to him, the only method by which this aid can be 
secured and the desired spiritual result achieved. All that 
is recommended to me for my good is either false or true. 
There can be but one true religion. The statement made by 
Jesus Christ, "Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men 
gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles ?" is just as true 
of religious systems and corrupt forms of Christianity, as it 
is of individual character. The Christian revelation suc- 
ceeds in accomplishing its mission of liberating and trans- 
forming the race, while all other systems fail. Christianity 
in its most simple and spiritual form stands the test of the 
severest trial. Hence we use this revelation as the test of 
all other religious systems. But we find "Honest Skeptics," 
like Thomas, who, while they are acquainted with the per- 

48 



A NEEDED EXHORTATION. 



49. 



fection and beauty of revealed truth, call for other, or more 
palpable proof. They are acquainted with this truth in its 
abstract form, what they desire is, to see the truth a living 
force. Such men naturally turn to the lives of professing 
Christians for this type of evidence. But why do they ex- 
amine the lives of professing Christians? Because a Chris^ 
tian man declares by his very profession of Christianity that 
he has tested, and is testing daily, that which the Bible 
recommends, and is proving its truth in his own experience. 
Hence we see the necessity of an upright life on the part 
of the Christian, if for no other reason than the furnishing 
of this type of evidence. The needy world around us, our 
own spiritual interests, and the blessed God who saves us, 
all demand this consistency on our part. It is the greatest 
need of the Church to-day. Without this consistency Chris- 
tianity fails in its most important mission in many cases. 
Why does it fail? Because men who are sinners are seek- 
ing for an excuse to cover their sinful lives, and for not be- 
coming Christians. Seeing these imperfections of fallible 
men, they at once construe them as being the failures of 
Divine truth, and then declare the Divine plan of salvation 
a failure; having found, as they suppose, the excuse for 
which they have' been seeking. It is therefore very easy 
to concede the necessity for such an exhortation as this con- 
tained in our text. 

Titus was a Gentile, converted under the labors of Paul, 
who became one of his most intimate companions. He made 
many journeys with the great " Apostle to the Gentiles," 
and at the time of the writing of this Epistle he had been 
left by him to complete the work of organizing the Church 
in the Island of Crete. The object of this letter is to advise 
Titus in this important work, and, through him, to lead the 
followers of Christ in this Island to a true conception of 
Christianity, and to a consistent following of Christ. 

A careful study of this text will lead us to consider two 
great facts. 



50 



A NEEDED EXHORTATION. 

I. THE FACT OF DOCTRINE. 



Now notice that Paul says doctrine, "Adorn the doc- 
trine," not doctrines. He stands in marked contrast with 
many men who consider themselves Apostles : and with 
many organizations which claim to be the only depository 
of truth among men. 1 These talk about doctrines, but Paul, 
who was given a personal revelation of Jesus Christ, says 
doctrine. He saw God's revelation of Himself, as given to 
him in person, and as recorded in the inspired history of the 
revelation, as one concentric whole : pointing the helpless 
sinner to a pitying, loving, helping God. From the first 
gray dawn of revelation's morning in the garden, until its 
noonday glory was reached in the upper room, at Pentecost, 
it was one doctrine, glorious in its completeness, "The doc- 
trine of God our Saviour." It mattered not to him in what 
garb the message came, or, by whom it was delivered : 
whether in cutting terms by uncouth and fiery reformer, 
flowing in limpid stream from lip of poet never since equaled, 
hymned by shepherd harpist, or chaste and pure from lip 
of him who "Spake as never man spake" : it was the one 
doctrine, the one message of love from condescending God 
to sinning man. 

These modernizers look upon it as divided into mole- 
hills of doctrine, pointing men to their little creeds and ex- 
clusive isms. As though the real object and end of Christi- 
anity was— to build up, and find its center, in their ecclesias- 
tical headquarters. The tendency with many is, to narrow 
down into — what this man says, or, this church holds. To 
discuss doctrines and dwell upon nonessentials, while "My 
people are destroyed for lack of knowledge." 

What God says, what he requires, these are important. 
The desire of God, his great heart-throbbing desire, is, the 
salvation of man. This is the real object of his doctrine and 
should be the chief aim of his followers. To lead men from 



A NEEDED EXHORTATION. 



51 



sin to God is the aim of all true religious work. This end 
can only be accomplished as consecrated attention and effort 
are applied in disseminating "The doctrine of God our 
Saviour." This universal desire and demand of God is not 
only necessary to us all, but is the chief demand of our own 
natures. The throbbing heart of the race cries in anxious 
desire "Oh, that I knew where I might find him !" "Show 
us the Father, and it sufficeth us." As this "Glorious Gospel 
of the blessed God" is presented in its simplicity and purity, 
men are led to its fountain, and find shelter in its bosom. 
As the sinner, feeling the burden of his sin and desiring 
relief, comes to his mercy-seat, and, giving up his sin and 
trusting in God, he feels the burden rolled away, and realizes 
that the mantle of Christ's atonement covers him. As the 
Holy Ghost with transforming power not only heals, but 
plants a new life within him, he realizes that "The darkness 
is past and the true light now shineth." He can now look 
into the face of that one whom he formerly feared and ex- 
claim with joy, "Abba Father," "My Lord and my God." 
As he marches joyfully onward, Godward, upward, "Hun- 
gering and thirsting after righteousness," "Denying ungod- 
liness and worldly lusts," living "Soberly, righteously, and 
godly, in this present world; looking for that blessed hope, 
and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour 
Jesus Christ ; who gave himself for us, that he might redeem 
us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar peo- 
ple, zealous of good works," he is willingly led to surrender 
all to God in consecration, the same Holy Spirit leading and 
guiding him "into all truth" and sealing the offering which 
he makes, and he himself is lost in love. He is now filled 
with the Divine fullness and possesses "Love, joy, peace, 
longsufTering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, tem- 
perance : against such there is no< law." This blessed "Doc- 
trine of God our Saviour" has become a part of himself. 
Blessed be God how graciously he saves. His plan faith- 



r>2 



A NEEDED EXHORTATION. 



fully tested, never fails. How perfectly did the Psalmist de- 
scribe the blessedness which comes to a soul when he sang 
"He brought me up out of an horrible pit, out of the miry 
clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. 
And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto 
our God; many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the 
Lord." Again, "He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and 
lifteth the needy out of the dunghill; that he may set him 
with princes, even with the princes of the people." 

II. THE FACT OF DUTY. 

Privilege always brings responsibility. The possession 
of treasure always necessitates care and watchfulness. So 
the Apostle exhorts the Cretian Christians, through Titus, 
in the language of the text. 

But why did this church need such vigilant care and 
earnest exhortation? Because its members had been digged 
from the lowest pit of heathen depravity ; called forth from 
the blackest night of beastly living. The Cretians were 
characterized by. insincerity, falsehood and gross living. 
'One of themselves, even a prophet of their own, said, 'The 
Cretians are always liars, evil beasts, slow bellies." (Titus 
[ :i2.) So that to be called a Cretian, became synonymous 
with being called a liar. Many of the members of this 
Church were slaves, and slaves, at that time were usually 
dishonest. We are told that servants were then so dis- 
honest, that they were commonly designated "thieves." 
Hence there was danger, lest their religion should degener- 
ate into a mere hollow sham ; and they should become cor- 
rupted from the purity and simplicity of the Gospel. These 
were the principal reasons for this exhortation, at the time 
of its delivery. 

But are we, the Christians of the Twentieth Century, 
free from fault ? Is there not as much need of this exhorta- 
tion to-day as at the time of its first writing and delivery? 



A NEEDED EXHORTATION. 



53 



Do not the professing Christians at the present time cultivate 
habits just as harmful, and follow tendencies just as evil 
as any found in the Cretian Church ? And is not this espe- 
cially true when the advantages under which men are placed 
to-day are considered ? After all, does not the Church at 
the opening of the new century need the same teaching, in 
kind and quality, as was needed in the Apostolic Age ? This 
duty therefore is a personal one, from which there can be no 
exemption. It comes just as directly to us as it did to the 
flock under the care of Titus. And, if its performance was 
possible to them, how much more so to us. 

It must be remembered, however, in considering this im- 
portant duty, that there must be objective before there can 
be subjective adornment. The power of this "doctrine" must 
be experienced in the heart before it can be manifested 'in 
the life. 

i. Objective adornment. The man as adorned by the 
doctrine. Behold him, sin stained and helpless, an outcast 
and defiled, in "an horrible pit," and sinking deeper into the 
"miry clay" ; then see him, with his "feet upon a rock," 
cleansed, a new life breathing in and through him, his goings 
established, "a new song" in his mouth, "even praise unto 
our God." This is the work of this doctrine, and it accom- 
plishes its mission. Examples of this blessed work are seen 
all around us. The drunkard, the fallen and degraded one, 
the self-righteous Pharisee, the opinionated moralist, are 
all rescued and transformed by this "Glorious Gospel of the 
blessed God." The Demoniac of Gadara, Mary Magdalen, 
Matthew the Publican, Saul of Tarsus, John Bunyan, are 
only specimens of ever recurring classes. The blessed rela- 
tion, into which the redeemed soul is brought with God, is 
the greatest adornment with which it can be clothed. "The 
Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the 
children of God : and if children, then heirs ; heirs of God, 
and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with 



54 



A NEEDED EXHORTATION. 



him, that we may be also glorified together." Rom. 8 :i6, 17. 

2. Subjective adornment. The "Doctrine" as adorned 
by the man. 

Can man add to the Gospel, and by so doing adorn 
it? No. 

Some things are so pure, so perfect and beautiful in 
themselves, that an added element obscures rather than re- 
veals them. Can art add purity or beauty to the spotless 
lily? Can it bring richness to the glossy leaf by changing its 
tint? The unsightly pebble, cut and polished by man's in- 
genuity, resulting in the sparkling diamond ; the bar of gold, 
shaped and polished by the hand of the artisan, each seem 
to have reached the acme of art. It does not seem possible 
to add to any of these, as single things, any adornment what- 
ever, but by a judicious combination, they may each be made 
to appear in added beauty. By surrounding the lily with the 
wreath of glossy leaves, we cause the perfection of both 
to stand out more fully before us. So the lustrous diamond, 
set in the burnished gold appears more brilliant than ever. 

It is impossible for man to add anything to this "Glorious 
Gospel" by way of adornment, for God looking down in 
satisfaction says : "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am 
well pleased ; hear ye him." And the Son himself reveals 
the fact of a complete Gospel, in his commission to his dis- 
ciples "Go ye." While we cannot therefore add to the Gos- 
pel, we may adorn it by revealing its results. We can make 
its power on our hearts and lives visible. Can clothe its pre- 
cepts, privileges, inward spiritual power, with outward con- 
duct becoming its purity and dignity. Can embody the glory 
and the grace of this unseen power in our daily walk and 
conversation. It is possible to so walk with God in spirit 
that we reveal him in our active lives. Man can come into 
such fellowship, and live in such intimacy with God, that 
his life will be an open book, in which all who are touched 
by his influence will read the secret of his purity. Men may 



A NEEDED EXHORTATION. 



55 



refuse to accept our creed, they may even reject our Bible, 
but they will "take knowledge" that men who live thus "have 
been with Jesus." Such lives are living epistles "known and 
read of all men." Such conduct will reveal at once both the 
object and the result of the Passion of our blessed Lord, 
"Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from 
all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zeal- 
ous of good works." 

"Oh, let our love and faith abound; 
Oh, let our lives, to all around, 

With purest luster shine ; 
That all around our works may see, 
And give the glory, Lord, to thee, 

The heavenly light divine." 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 



BY REV. W. F. SHORT, D. D., 

Presiding Elder of West Jacksonville District. 

"The Lord of hosts is with us ; the God of Jacob is our refuge." 
— Psalm 46 :7. 

Biblical scholars have suggested many interpretations 
and conjectures of the occasion and authorship of this re- 
markably poetic and sublime Hebrew hymn. It was prob- 
ably written over five hundred years before Christ. Some 
suppose that the occasion was an earthquake that occurred 
on the night that Sennacherib's army was destroyed, from 
the physical disturbances described in the second and third 
verses : 

"Therefore will we not fear, though the earth be re- 
moved, and though the mountains be carried into the midst 
of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, 
though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof." 

Other learned biblical commentators have supposed that 
the convulsions described in these verses refer to political 
disturbances like those that occurred in the Persian empire 
after the death of Cambyses when the Magi usurped the 
government. 

The very ancient opinion that it was composed on the 
occasion of the deliverance of Jerusalem from Sennacherib's 
invasion is very probable ; while some think that it was com- 
posed by David over his victories over the Ammonites and 
Syrians. 

But the date, the occasion and the authorship of this 
ancient and truly sublime ode will always remain matters of 
uncertainty, 

56 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 57 



Whatever the historical origin of the Psalm may have 
been, it may be interpreted as a prophetic declaration and 
proof of the permanence, resources and final triumph of the 
church. 

Converging mountain streamlets and brooks formed the 
gently flowing Shiloh that watered Jerusalem. The poet 
saw in this the suggestion of the churches' source of the 
"living waters" whose ceaseless flow should extend and en- 
large till its refreshing presence would meet the needs of 
humanity's thirst. "There is a river, the streams whereof 
make glad the City of God, the holy place of the taber- 
nacles of the Most High." Raging heathen, and unholy 
kingdoms are powerless before the God who dwells in our 
spiritual Jerusalem; "God shall help her, and that right 
early" to universal dominion. The exhortation of the 
Psalmist is peculiarly descriptive and applicable to-day, 
"Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he 
hath made in the earth. He maketh wars to cease unto the 
end of the earth ; he breaketh the bow and cutteth the spear 
in sunder; he burnetii the chariot in the fire. Be still, and 
know that I am God; I will be exalted among the heathen, 
I will be exalted in the earth. The Lord of Hosts is with 
us; the God of Jacob is our refuge." 

While the primary aim of the writer of the Psalm was 
to set forth in poetic imagery, the church's state and re- 
sources as interpreted in the foregoing, yet without 
violence to its meaning my text may be regarded as 
descriptive of the confidence and security of the believer. 
God takes care of his church by taking care of 
the individual. The protection of the concrete could not 
exist without the protection of the abstract, of the universal 
without the individual. Inspired writers employ a great 
variety of figures to represent to us what God is to his peo- 
ple, seizing upon the most exalted and suggestive objects, 
callings, and relationships, to aid our faith, hope and con- 
fidence. 



58 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 



"The Lord God is a sun and shield ;" "the Lord is my rock 
and my fortress;" "Who is a rock, save our God?" "Thou 
art my King, O God;" "The Lord is my shepherd;" "O 
Lord, thou art our Father ;" "And I will be a Father unto 
you." These and many other expressive terms are numer- 
ously employed throughout the Holy Scriptures to convey to 
our minds some conception of what God is to us, and our 
relation to him. 

In the text we have a double metaphor taken from the 
military calling; a familiar occupation, and- often used to 
designate the character of the Christian life. In this two 
fold figure, we have suggested two of the most important 
elements in intelligent warfare — numbers and defense. 
These necessary considerations are always regarded as 
essential to a successful campaign. Leadership, discipline, 
and courage do not constitute a full equipment for a vic- 
torious army. Let us study these elements in the order in 
which they are suggested in the text, and seek to grasp their 
significance as they are related to our individual lives. 

i. "The Lord of hosts is with us." The underlying 
truth contained in these words, and which is intended by the 
Psalmist to form the ground of our confidence and inspira- 
tion is numbers. In any undertaking, it is helpful to our 
zeal and courage to find ourselves supported by the concert 
and sympathy of numbers who are in harmony with our 
purposes and plans. 

The religious life is highly susceptible to this principle. 
A consciousness of our personal weakness, and the powerful 
forces of opposition render the assurance of adequate 
co-operation a mighty incentive to persevering and 
courageous exertion. 

Let us inquire as to the actual and available forms of 
such co-operation, comprised in the words "The Lord of 
hosts." It is a phrase occurring in our Holy Scriptures 
more than fifty times, and is used to convey to our minds 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 



59 



some idea of the means at God's command for the care and 
defense of His people, and the manifestation of His great- 
ness and glory. God's resources for that purpose are mani- 
fold and mighty. Of their availability and sufficiency there 
can be no doubt or uncertainty. All forces, material and 
immaterial, animate and inanimate, may be marshaled and 
directed at his will to protect or to destroy. Our enumer- 
ation. of them here can only be suggestive and partial. 

i. It is inclusive of material and physical forces. These 
exist in great numbers. Their subtle and tremendous en- 
ergy have often been evoked for the defense and deliverance 
of his people. When the world's wickedness had grown to 
unendurable enormity, he unloosed his hand and a deluge 
swept over the earth. 

He had only to unbridle the agencies at his command and 
plague stricken Egypt emancipated his enslaved and op- 
pressed people. These forces formed a pathway through the 
sea for their safe passage, and then engulfed their pursuing 
adversaries. 

By them manna and meat and water were supplied dur- 
ing their long and eventful pilgrimage. They illumined their 
nightly bivouac with the splendor of noonday, and frowned 
with the blackness of midnight upon the camp of their ma- 
lignant pursuers. 

They were detailed as a commissary with supplies to feed 
a dispairing prophet in the wilderness, and replenished the 
meager store of a worthy widow. They sealed up the foun- 
tains of the firmament till drought and death covered the 
land in a pall of wretchedness, and at his word were un- 
locked and poured their refreshing treasures upon an im- 
poverished people. He quenched the fierceness of the flame, 
and quelled the lion's rage, and his servants were unharmed. 
Water became wine at the nuptial feast, and the storm king 
was powerless when an apostle was to be saved from ship- 
wreck. The sun and moon halted in their circuit to give 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 



assistance and victory to Joshua; and the stars fought 
against Sisera and wrought his overthrow. 

Thus the tremendous forces of nature form a part of the 
hosts of the Lord, always available for the protection or 
deliverance of his people. Resting in the stability and uni- 
form order of the material universe, they are assured that 
their bread shall be given and their water shall be sure, and 
of protection against all foes however numerous or malig- 
nant. Sustained by this faith Henry Kirk White sung : 

"The Lord our God is clothed with might, 

The winds obey his will ; 
He speaks and in his heavenly height 
The rolling sun stands still. 

Rebel, ye waves, and o'er the land 

With threatening aspect roar; 
The Lord uplifts his awful hand, 
And chains you to the shore. 

Ye winds of night, your force combine ; 
Without his high behest, 
Ye shall not, in the mountain pine, 
Disturb the sparrow's nest." 

2. His People are a part of his hosts. 

A sense of loneliness and isolation is always deeply de- 
pressing. Solitariness usually is wretchedness. Prosecuting 
a long and difficult task alone, bereft of companionship, and 
co-operation, and sympathy, weakens the purpose and reso- 
lution. The assurance of sympathetic regard lightens toil 
and softens hardship. Despondency occasioned by the feel- 
ing of isolation from the consideration and sympathetic in- 
terest of others is not unusual in the experience of believers, 
and often becomes a source of temptation and weakness. 
To feel that one is unnoticed, uncared for, and unhelped, 
is to enervate and finally to settle in despair. Such a mood 



/ 



the: security of the righteous. ei 



seized Elijah when, having fled from Ahab, and hid in a cave, 
he gave vent to the sad refrain: "I have been very jealous 
of the Lord God of hosts ; because the children of Israel 
have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars and 
slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am 
left; and they seek my life, to take it away." To this woe- 
ful lament the Lord replied: "Yet I have left me seven 
thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed unto 
Baal." 

There is a Communion of Saints, undescribed by ecclesi- 
astical titles; unbounded by churchly lines and formulated 
dogmas, confessions of faith and articles of religion ; a com- 
munion that is inclusive of all of every color, creed and 
clime, of every name and order, who love our Lord Jesus 
Christ in sincerity; whose "Hearts and hopes and aims are 
one." All share in this universal fellowship, and are debtors 
to its support. "One family, we dwell in Him." Nor is 
this source of helpfulness limited to the church militant. 
From beyond the Jordan sympathizing reinforcements, "a 
cloud of witnesses" lend their ministries. 
3. Angels are a part of his hosts. 

If angelic sympathy and service were not revealed in the 
word of God, unbiased reason would suggest their probabil- 
ity. Angels and man have so much in common, as is sug- 
gested by their origin, intelligence, spiritual natures, and 
immortality, that by the law of kinship and destiny there 
must exist a mighty bond of interest and affectionate sym- 
pathy. Nor is it improbable, judging by the well known fact 
that misfortune and weakness in human beings evokes ten- 
der regard from the more favored and strong, that the very 
ills of our unfortunate branch of God's great family would 
awaken and intensify the sympathetic interest, and move 
the compassion of our angelic kindred. 

But we are not left to conjecture as to this matter of 
such momentous importance to us. 



62 THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 



The Holy Scriptures are laden and illumined with state- 
ments and suggestions on the subject. When creation's 
stupendous work was completed, the man, the culminating 
product of creative energy, "made in the image of God," 
only "a little lower than the angels," was born into the 
spiritual household, "the morning stars sang together, and 
all the sons of God shouted for joy." This refers to some 
intelligent beings who existed before the creation of the 
visible heavens and earth, and the angelic host is surely 
meant. They celebrated not only God's wisdom and power 
manifested in the material universe, but they hailed in high- 
est strains the accession of a kindred being to their glorious 
ranks. 

We would therefore expect that this new member of 
their spiritual household would become the subject of no- 
tice; and that in the event of individual or general misfor- 
tune or distress their helpful ministries would not be with- 
held. Reason as well as revelation would suggest "The 
angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear 
him, and delivereth them." About two hundred passages 
and instances are recorded in the word of God relating to 
angelic ministrations in behalf of human need. These are 
so varied in character and occasions as to ground the belief 
that there is no exigency in human experience, however 
little or great, common or unusual, that transcends their 
notice, or exceeds the possibility of their help and deliver- 
ance. From Abraham to Malachi we have an unbroken his- 
tory of angelic missions to our world, and of victories won 
for the servants and people of God. 

An angel was the first to announce to the watchful shep- 
herds the advent of the Redeemer of the world, and "Sud- 
denly there was with, the angel a multitude of the heavenly 
host, praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, 
and on earth peace, good will toward men." After his 
temptation "angels came and ministered unto him." In his 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 63 



overwhelming, agony in Gethsemane "there appeared an an- 
gel from heaven, strengthening him." When the armed 
mob came to arrest him, he defiantly challenged them by say- 
ing "Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, 
and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of 
angels ?" On the morning of the third day "the angel of the 
Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the 
stone from the door, and sat upon it," and commissioned the 
visiting women to go and publish his resurrection. 

After his ascension, two angels, in the form of men, in 
white apparel, stood by his disciples, as they looked stead- 
fastly toward heaven, as he went up, saying, "Ye men of 
Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same 
Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so 
come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven." 

Like angelic ministries were often bestowed upon his 
servants for their protection or deliverance from their ene- 
mies. 

Are not God's people as dear to him now? Why not? 
Has God changed? Is help less needed by his children? 
If not, then must his hosts be equally available in our time 
of need or my text is a meaningless and tantalizing mockery. 

II. THE GOD OF JACOB IS OUR REFUGE. 

In these words we have a repeated statement of the se- 
curity of the righteous under another figurative form of 
expression that is strongly suggestive and inspiring. The 
phrase, "The God of Jacob," occurs many times in the Holy 
Scriptures, and always as a ground of confidence and en- 
couragement. In the mind of those who used the phrase, 
there must have appeared something in the life and character 
of the patriarch Jacob so conspicuous, so singular as to 
constitute him an example or illustration of especial promi- 
nence and consideration. If inspired writers had used the 
form, The God of Abraham or Moses, or Joshua, or Elijah, 
or Daniel, or Paul, in either instance it would have had 



64 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 



profound meaning and inspiration. The frequent use of the 
words, "The God of Jacob," implies that there was in Jacob's 
history something that made him more marked and represen- 
tative in certain particulars than any other ; that in him we 
have a high example of provision for the needs of universal 
humanity ; that God is an accessible and all-sufficient refuge 
for his people in all times and all trials. Recurring to his life 
we have no difficulty in fixing upon the events that most dis- 
tinguish his life in the matters that are common and vital 
to mankind wherever found, and will continue to be till the 
end of time. 

These universal and paramount interests may be reduced 
to two particulars, all others being either implied or included 
in their comprehension. 

These two particulars, naming them in the order of time 
in which they are recorded in the life of the patriarch, are 
Providence and Pardon. 

i. Providence. 

An unfortunate parental favoritism was early allowed to 
develop in the family of Isaac, the father cherishing a prefer- 
ence for Esau, the mother for Jacob. This naturally re- 
sulted in the extinguishment of proper fraternal regard, 
and finally in the advantage taken of Esau's dire necessity 
in obtaining his birthright by Jacob. Her maternal par- 
tiality culminated at last in fraudulently procuring the dying 
blessing of the father. A plot so unbrotherly and so 
heinous in its source and methods, being instigated by the 
mother of the wronged and rightful claimant, was soon 
followed by the flight of Jacob from his angry brother to 
Padan-Aram. What an indescribably pitiable spectacle to 
behold a young man banished from his home under such 
circumstances, weighted down with the consciousness of his 
enormous guilt. It is a serious matter for a young man to 
leave the parental home under any circumstances and go 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 65 



out alone into the world. But to be driven out by an out- 
raged, infuriated brother and for an unnatural fraternal 
conspiracy, plotted and aided by the mother of both, was an 
awful experience. 

How dreadful must have been his feelings as the dark- 
ness oi the night settled over his unsheltered, tired and hun- 
gry body ! What crushing solitariness oppressed his soul ! 
What utter abandonment ! What anxious solicitude as to 
the supply of his future temporal needs ! These were the 
thoughts and forebodings that burdened his stone-pillowed 
head till sleep came and brought rest to his weary body, and 
forgetfulness to his guilty conscience. How naturally came 
also the vision of the ladder connecting earth and heaven, 
.affording a passageway for angelic ministries, symbolizing 
the intelligent providential forces that link the two worlds 
in perpetual and indissoluble union. 

Let us recall the incident, so graphically described, 
herein : 

And he lighted upon a certain place, and tarried there 
all night, because the sun was set and he took of the stones 
of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in 
that place to sleep. 

And he dreamed, and behold a ladder set up on the earth, 
and the top of it reached to heaven ; and behold the angels of 
God ascending and descending on it. 

And behold, the Lord stood above it, and said, I am the 
Lord God of Abraham thy Father, and the God of Isaac; 
the land whereon thou liest, to thee will I give it, and to thy 
seed. 

And thy seed shall be as the dust of the earth ; and thou 
shalt spread abroad to the west, and to the east, and to the 
north, and to the south ; and in thee, and in thy seed, shall 
all the families of the earth be blessed. 

And behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all 
places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this 



66 THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 

land ; for I will not leave thee, until I have clone that which 
I have spoken to thee of. 

And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely 
the Lord is in this place, and I knew it not. 

And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place ; 
this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate 
of heaven. 

And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the 
stone that he had put for his pillows, and set it up for a 
pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it. 

And he called the name of that place Beth-el, but the 
name of that city was called Luz at the first. 

And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, if God will be with me, 
and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me 
bread to eat, and raiment to put on. 

So that I come again to my father's house in peace, then 
shall the Lord be my God. 

And this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be 
God's house, and of all that thou shalt give me, I will surely 
give the tenth unto thee. 

It will be observed that in this narrative the only mat- 
ter of moment and significance in what is recorded of both 
God and Jacob is that which relates to providence. There 
is no rebuke for Jacob's sin ; there is no confession of guilt ; 
no penitence expressed ; no pardon implored. True to his 
dominating selfish instincts he is concerned only about tem- 
poral provision for his needs and sordid ambition. In amazing 
condescension God meets him on that plane and ratifies his 
self-proposed engagement. Subsequent temporal prosperity 
in wonderful measure enriched him. Thence forward he 
became a conspicuous representative, and an enduring mon- 
ument to all generations, of a divine providence over this 
world, and a foundation of confidence and hope as long as 
the world endures. 

This view was never pleasurable to godless men who 
have not liked "to retain God in their knowledge." It trott- 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 67 

bles them. Hence the attempt of atheism to construct a 
theory of the universe by eliminating God from the problem. 
What violence to sound reason ! What depth of blindness 
and perversity ! What heartless trifling with the yearnings, 
the weaknesses, the misfortunes of poor and helpless hu- 
manity ! 

In resplendent contrast with the gloom and despair of a 
godless faith, the righteous turn to the scene at Bethel, and 
in the ladder connecting earth and heaven, thronged with 
ministering messengers, find unfailing assurance of a pro- 
vision for every necessity and every time. On the promises 
of God, more enduring than stones, they pillow their heads 
in unwavering trustfulness and composure. The stability, 
the order, the beneficent operations of the universe are fully 
and forever assured. 

"Fear not ; for I have redeemed thee. I have called 
thee by thy name ; thou art mine. 

"When thou passest through the waters, I will be with 
thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee; 
when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be 
burned ; neither shall the flames kindle upon thee. 

"For I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, 
thy Saviour. 

"Fear not, for I am with thee. 

"He shall dwell on high ; his place of defense shall be 
the munitions of rocks ; bread shall be given him ; his waters 
shall be sure. 

"Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty; they shall 
behold the land that is very far off." 

Sustained by an intelligent faith, in the darkest hour, 
the believer may exultantly sing: 

"Peace, troubled soul, thou need' st not fear ; 
Thy great Provider still is near; 
Who fed thee last, will feed thee still ; 
Be calm, and sink into His will. 



68 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 



If what I wish is good, 

And suits the will divine, 
By earth and hell in vain withstood, 

I know it shall be mine. 

Still let them counsel take 

To frustrate His decree ; 
They cannot keep a blessing back, 

By heaven designed for me.'' 

2. Pardon. 

In the patriarch Jacob we also have revealed a refuge 
for man as a sinner. The time came when it seemed neces- 
sary for Jacob to emigrate from the country in which he 
had sojourned for several decades. The same spirit and 
methods that had characterized him in early life for selfish- 
ness, shrewdness and dishonesty were resorted to in his 
adopted home. With his household and herds it was de- 
cided that he would return to his native land. But there 
was an insuperable barrier in the accomplishment of that 
resolve. His brother Esau was still living. Absence and 
years had not appeased his enmity, that only wanted an op- 
portunity to avenge itself. This was well realized by Jacob 
An awful emergency confronted him. He was insufficient 
for it. His tact and resourcefulness that had availed him so 
well in other straits were inadequate now. A second time 
he seemed to realize the need of help beyond himself. With- 
out it his defeat was sure and overwhelming. He had come 
at last to the end of his strength. What could he do ? Only 
one of two things — surrender to the vengeance of Esau, or 
seek deliverance from God. The decision was soon and 
wisely reached. 

Prudently planning propitiatory measures in the disposi- 
tion of his effects and household, he fell back upon the only 
available reserve provision for helpless and guilty humanity 
in such extremity ; he sought help and deliverance from 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 69 



God. A long and dark reckoning was now to be had. An 
enormous magnitude of unrepented and unforgiven sins had 
accumulated. How was the debt to be canceled? Only in 
one way. There has never been, there never will be, another 
for our bankrupt race. Repentance, prayer, faith; these 
absolve from the condemnation, pollution, and consequences 
of sin. 

"And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man 
with him until the breaking of the day. 

"And when he saw that he prevailed not against him, he 
touched the hollow of his thigh; and the hollow of Jacob's 
thigh was out of joint as he wrestled with him. 

"Arid he said, Let me go, for the day breaketh. And he 
said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me. 

"And he said unto him, What is thy name ? And he said, 
Jacob. 

"And he said thy name shall be called no- more Jacob, but 
Israel; for as a prince hast thou power with God and with 
men, and hast prevailed. 

"And Jacob asked him, and said, Tell me, I pray thee, 
thy name. And he said, Wherefore is it that thou dost ask 
after my name ? And he blessed Mm there. 

"And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel; for I 
have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved." 

We have herein suggested the answer to the weightiest 
question that ever came from human lips — How may sin be 
pardoned? This question has had ceaseless repetition 
through all the centuries and has been as universal as the 
race. The patriarch Job spoke for the ages when he asked : 
"How should man be just with God?" He everywhere feels 
himself to be out of harmony with a something above him 
which claims his allegiance. He cannot get away from it. 
No depth of intellectual or moral degradation can effectually 
and permanently silence it. Every altar, and ceremony, and 
temple, and priest in Pagan and in Christian lands is evi- 



70 



THE SECURITY OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 



dence and confirmation of this universal human conscious- 
ness. Jacob found the only refuge from sin in God; in 
Jacob's God is found a refuge for all sinners. David was 
a great sinner. From fathomless depths of iniquity God's 
pardoning mercy rescued him, and set his feet upon a rock, 
and taught him a new song. 

Saul of Tarsus was a great sinner. O wretched man that 
I am ! who shall deliver me from the body of this death, or 
more correctly, from the dead and putrefying body of my 
sins, described his awfully sinful state. "I thank God, 
through Jesus Christ our Lord," was the assuring answer. 
Unnumbered millions who once were great sinners have 
found in the God of Jacob a providential and moral refuge. 
Jacob, Bethel, Peniel. What a trinity ! Immortal names ! 
As long as time endures, and as long as a sense of need bur- 
dens human hearts, will these names inspire faith and hope. 

When Luther was depressed by discouragements he 
would say : "Come, let us sing the forty-sixth Psalm." 
What unlimited resources are here suggested. What num- 
berless reinforcements appear as we wage the battle against 
the leagued hosts that confront us ! What a stimulus to 
valor w T hen God marshals his hosts for our defense and tri- 
umph ! 

"The Lord of hosts is with us ; the God of Jacob is our 
Refuge." Amen. 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



BY REV. S. W. THORNTON. 

Pastor at Hoopeston. 

"'Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for 
them who shall be heirs of salvation?" — Heb. 1:14. 

In the scriptures we have frequent reference to spiritual 
beings, inhabitants of heaven, called Angels. 

The Bible speaks of them just as it does of God, and of 
Satan, assuming their existence to be a fact, but giving us 
no account of their creation or any special description of 
their nature. 

We have in the scriptures an account of twenty-two dif- 
ferent appearances of angels to men and women, and from 
these accounts we learn some facts about them. 

First, we observe that they are possessed of the same 
faculties that we possess, viz., speech, sight, hearing, feeling 
and reasoning. By this we reason that our Creator was also 
their Creator, and that they, like ourselves, were created 
"in the image of God" with the faculties of reason, sensibil- 
ities and will. 

Second, we observe that they appear to human beings 
in bodily form. It has been supposed that they do this or 
assume this form of appearance because men could not 
understand or comprehend them in any pure spiritual mani- 
festation, but to my mind I think of them as always inhabit- 
ing a spiritual body. "There is a spiritual body" (1 Cor. 
15-44), i. e., there is a body controlled by the Spirit it en- 
shrines, and wholly under its direction. This is the sort of 



72 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



body with which the saints of God shall be clothed after 
the resurrection. "It is sown in natural body, it is raised 
in spiritual body." Here the Spirit is largely under the 
influence of the body it inhabits, but there the spirit will con- 
trol. I argue that our Lord taught that the body of the 
saints in the resurrection will be like the body of the angels. 
In Luke 20 135 he uttered this teaching : 

"35. Biut they which shall be accounted worthy to ob- 
tain that world, and the resurrection from the dead, neither 
marry, nor given in marriage. 

"36. Neither can they die any more ; for they are equal 
unto the angels; and are the children of God, being the chil- 
dren of the resurrection." 

"These angels are of marvelous beauty and glory." — - 
(Dan. 10:5-6.) 

"5. Then I lifted up mine eyes, and looked, and behold a 
certain man clothed in linen, whose loins were girded with 
fine gold of Uphaz. 

"6. His body also was like the beryl, and his face as the 
appearance of lightning, and his eyes as lamps of fire, and 
his arms and his feet like in color to polished brass, and the 
voice of his words like the voice of a multitude." 

As we study them further we learn that they possess the 
same powers that Jesus did after his resurrection. They 
come and go at will, unhindered by any of earth's laws of 
gravitation or resistance. 

They are visible or invisible to human sight or hearing, 
as they will. 

They eat and drink, at will. 

They are always young in appearance ; they never grow 

old. 

Again, as they are created beings, we therefore reason 
that they are finite. If finite, then, it follows that they are 
imperfect in knowledge and that they are, and will be, 
students and learners of the wonders and mysteries of their 
Creator, throughout eternity. 



The ministry of angels. 



73 



Also this finiteness implies probation — the being placed 
on trial. So we read in Jude : 

"6. And the angels which kept not their first estate, but 
left their own. habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting 
chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day." 

These words "kept not" and "left" imply the same free- 
dom of will in which we were created. 

Next, their number. In Daniel 7: 10, "Thousand thou- 
sands ministered unto him." A thousand thousand' is a 
million, but this second numeral is plural, so we must think 
of millions. In Hebrews 12 : 22 : "An innumerable company 
of angels." The word translated is myriad, which is a 
word always used to express a countless number, like the 
leaves of the forest, or the sands of the seashore. When 
Peter drew his sword in his Master's defense, Matt. 26:51- 
53, Jesus said : 

"Put up again thy sword into his place : for all they that 
take the sword shall perish with the sword. 

"53. Thinkest thou that I cannot pray to my Father, 
and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of 
angels?" — more than seventy-two thousand angels. 

The next thought is that of their power. 

The two women, on their way to the sepulchre, raise the 
question : "Who shall roll us away the stone ?" a stone of 
such size that doubtless several men were required to put it 
in place. But when they came to it, lo ! an angel had rolled 
away the stone. 

In 2nd Kings, 19 135, we read : 

"35. And it came to pass that night, that the angel 
of the Lord went out, and smote in the camp of the Assyri- 
ans a hundred fourscore and five thousand ; and when they 
arose early in the morning, behold, they were all dead 
corpses." 

I have thus gone over this introduction in order to pre- 
pare the way for the great lesson of comfort for the saints 



74 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELA. 



of the Lord, as taught by our text, viz., that God ouf 
Father has graciously ordered that this myriad host of an- 
gels who surround his throne, who are his companions in 
heaven, are to be ministering spirits to his children here on 
earth. Not that any part of the personal care and provi- 
dence of God himself is thereby lessened. God the Father is 
still the same omnipotent, omniscient, all-wise compassionate 
father over all his children. God the Son is ever the omnip- 
otent intercessor and advocate, at the right hand of the 
Father making intercession for us, and God the Holy Ghost 
now with us in the church is the comforter, the guide, and 
teacher of every Christian. But, in additon to all this, in 
the wonderful plan of salvation, God has added the minis- 
try of angels. 

There is a phrase in ist Peter I :i2, that has always fired 
my imagination. , 

"12. Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto them- 
selves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are 
now reported unto you by them that have preached the gos- 
pel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, 
which things the angels desire to look into." 

It is the phrase "which things the angels desire to look 
into." 

The mind at once goes back in fancy to that time, in 
heaven, when because of man's fall a way was sought for 
his redemption and the salvation of the race. That moment 
when our Saviour cried (Isa. 63: 5) "And I looked and 
there was none to help, and I wondered that there was none 
to uphold; therefore mine own arm brought salvation." I 
have thought of the angels as, among them, search was 
made if perchance some one or all of them might be able to 
purchase man's salvation. But no. Not even Michael, the 
archangel, could save a dost sinner. 

Then upon their minds and hearts must have grown a 
never ending wonder at a salvation so great that nothing less 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 16 

than the incarnation, suffering and death of the Son of God 
himself could provide, and into this gospel the angels desired 
to look. And as we study the story of man's redemption 
we find the angels ever present. 

An angel announced to the virgin the fact of her con- 
ception by the Holy Ghost of the Divine Child. Angels 
sang the annunciation of his birth to the astonished shep- 
herds. An angel tells Joseph to escape with the Holy Child 
from the wrath of Herod. An angel tells him when to re- 
turn. When Jesus had met and foiled Satan in the wilder- 
ness and was weary and hungry "angels came and minis- 
tered unto him." I believe that in those nights of prayer, 
when alone on the mountain side Jesus communed with his 
Father, that his angel messengers came and helped him. 

In the awful struggle in the garden of Gethsemane there 
"appeared an angel strengthening him." 

Who can doubt but that legions of angels hovered over 
the cross on Calvary in that awful six hours in which our 
Christ, "the lamb slain from the foundation of the world," 
suffered and died that we might live ? Then, from the 
words of the twenty-fourth Psalm, the church has always 
understood that a vast company of angels accompanied him 
home from earth to heaven on the day of his ascension. 

I think, then, that they "desired to look into" the work of 
the growth of the church in the world. To them, as they saw 
the amazing depth of sin and rebellion into which human- 
ity had fallen, it must have been a mystery how God could 
be just and yet be the justifier of him who believes on 
Jesus. 

Then, it seems to me, it was that God said to the angels, 
"I give you work to do. These children of mine on earth 
are yet in a world of sin and temptation. Satan and his 
angels yet have access to them. You know these fallen 
spirits and you know their wiles. Go and watch over my 
saints — protect them when in danger, whenever and wher- 



76 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



ever, in accordance with my general laws, you can aid or 
comfort them. Do it, and when their earthly journey shall 
be ended, guide them home. 

So I believe that the very air around us is thronged with 
angels. They come and go on errands of love. They hover 
over our congregations and watch with anxious hearts what 
the effect of the word will be when a sinner repents and 
accepts Jesus as Saviour. They speed away to the throne 
of their Lord and bear the glad news. When God's dear 
ones are tried in some furnace of fire they know how to lin- 
ger near, and in some way that we know not, administer 
comfort.. 

"Are they not ail ministering spirits sent forth to minis- 
ter for them who shall be heirs of salvation \?" 

Out of this teaching has grown the theory of special 
guardian angels — that to each one of God's children is as- 
signed an angel, either at his birth into the world or when 
he is born again, who shall be his own special guardian. 

This was the faith of Doctor Bickerstith, out of which 
he wrote that tender, soul-inspiring poem, "Yesterday, To- 
day and Forever," a poem that I urge you to read. But as 
to the truth of this theory the scriptures are silent. It may 
be so, it may not, but of the ministry of angels we have no^ 
question. This great fact established, let us gather up some 
precious lessons. 

First. That this ministry of angels explains all spiritual 
phenomena. It is the true spiritism. 

We live on the borders of a world of spirits. That 
spirits, both bad and good., have access to earth has always 
been the belief of men of all ages and of all nations. Jesus 
Christ has taught us the glad truth of the soul's immortality, 
and that death has no power over the spirit. When the 
body, the frail earthly tent, is torn down, the spirit, clothed 
with all its powers, goes at once to the world of spirits. In 
that spirit realm those who have gone from us retain their 



1 HE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



personality just as when in the flesh. They know, they see, 
they hear, they feel, they remember. The good are inex- 
pressibly happy; the wicked are miserable. 

Now, fond love, out ef its unutterable longings 

"For the touch of a vanished hand, 
For the sound of a voice that is still" 

has hoped and believed that the dear ones who have gone 
from our embrace do return and linger near us. We hear 
the sentiment often expressed that the mother comes back 
from heaven to be the guardian angel over her wayward 
boy ; or that the wife returns to be near the sorrowing hus- 
band. 

This fancy, carried further, has built up the entire system 
of spiritualism, a fancy that makes the departed spirits of 
our dead to be around us always and to communicate their 
presence by certain signs, through the aid of some medium. 

Now to all this I beg lovingly to dissent. No man could 
be more interested in such a thing than myself. Most of my 
kindred are on the other shore. Father, mother, children, 
wife and a host of my dearest friends of earth are with the 
redeemed in glory. But I find no warrant in the Bible to 
believe that they ever return. 

But two of the millions of earth's dead have ever come 
back, and they were Moses and Elijah, on an errand to the 
Mount of Transfiguration, to talk with Jesus about his 
coming death on the cross. 

The greatest possible reason for the coming of a disem- 
bodied spirit back to earth would be to help to save a sinner 
who is wandering from God; but the Holy Ghost tells us 
positively that if any sinner will not believe the messages, 
the warnings and the gracious invitations already given, 
"neither would he believe though one rose from the dead.''' 

Cowper may sing: 



78 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



"My mother, when I learned that thou wast dead ; 
Say, wast thou conscious of the tears I shed? 
Hovered thy spirit o'er thy sorrowing son; 
Wretch even then life's journey just begun?" 

But as for me I do not believe that mother hovered over 
me. I believe she was "at rest from her labors," in the 
Paradise of God. 

And as to modern spiritualism, the idea that any saint 
of God, who having "washed his robes and made them white 
in the blood of the lamb," having finished his course and 
entered into the presence of Christ, should then return in the 
night, into some circle of sinful men and women, at the call 
of an utter unbeliever in Jesus Christ as the one atone- 
ment for sin, is repugnant to all common sense, as well as 
faith. 

Again, human beings, when they die, do not become 
angels. They are saints. They "rest from their labors, and 
their works do follow them," and when Jesus comes the 
second time they are represented as coming with him, to 
reinhabit their bodies then raised from the dead. 

But now this revelation of the ministry of angels does 
come as a wise, safe, intelligent explanation of this entire 
question. Nor are we left to mere speculation as to how 
they come and why they come. Enough has been revealed 
in the Word of God to satisfy any one of candid faith. 
There is a passage in Daniel ioth that to my mind clearly 
explains how angels may minister to men, although unseen : 

"2. In those days I Daniel was mourning three full 
weeks. 

"3. I ate no pleasant bread, neither came flesh nor wine 
in my mouth, neither did I anoint myself at all, till three 
whole weeks were fulfilled. 

"4. And in the fourth and twentieth day of the first 
month, as I was by the side of the great river, which is 
Hiddekel ; 



THE MINISTRY 01" ANGELS. 



79 



"5, Then I lifted up mine eyes, and looked, and behold a 
certain man clothed in linen, whose loins were girded with 
fine gold of Uphaz ; 

"6. His body also was like the beryl, and his face as the 
appearance of lightning, and his eyes as lamps of fire, and 
his arms and his feet like in colour to polished brass, and 
the voice of his words like the voice of a multitude. 

"11. And he said unto me, O Daniel, a man greatly be- 
loved, understand the words that I speak unto thee, and 
stand upright; for unto thee am I now sent. And when 
he had spoken this word unto me, I stood trembling. 

"12. Then said he unto me, Fear not, Daniel ; for from 
the first day that thou didst set thine heart to understand, 
and to chasten thyself before thy God, thy words were 
heard, and I am come for thy words. 

"13. But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood 
me one and twenty days ; but, lo, Michael, one of the chief 
princes, came to help me ; and I remained there with the 
kings of Persia. 

"14. Now I am come to make thee understand what shall 
befall thy people in the latter days ; for yet the vision is for 
many days. 

"O man greatly beloved, fear not ; peace be unto thee ; 
be strong, yea, be strong. And when he had spoken unto 
me, I was strengthened, and said, Let my lord speak; for 
thou hast strengthened me. 

"20. Then said he, Knowest thou wherefore I come unto 
thee? and now will I return to fight with the prince of 
Persia ; and when I am gone forth, lo, the prince of Grecia 
shall come. 

"21. But I will shew thee, that which is noted in the 
Scripture of truth ; and there is none that holdeth with me 
in these things, but Michael your prince." 



80 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



You observe in this account that the angel revealed him- 
self to Daniel and talked with him; but it is to the angel's 
mission to Cyrus I call your attention. 

Daniel was fasting and praying to God for the restora- 
tion of his people and for the rebuilding of Jerusalem. God 
had moved Cyrus, king of Persia, to do all this for the 
Jewish people, but for some reason Cyrus was dilatory in 
performing it. But now, we are told, that at the beginning 
of Daniel's prayer the command was given to this angel to 
s go to Daniel, and on the way to stop and move Cyrus to do 
his duty. Gabriel at last comes to Daniel, calls him "greatly 
beloved of God" and tells him that he had come sooner had 
not Cyrus withstood him for twenty-one days, and even 
then Gabried did not leave Cyrus until Michael, the arch- 
angel, came to take his place. Now God chose to use the 
the ministry of an angel to influence Cyrus. That angel 
could only be in one place at a time. Hozv he went about it 
to induce Cyrus to hurry forward God's work we can only 
conjecture. Michael comes and relieves Gabriel, and 
"fights" or strives with Cyrus. Cyrus certainly saw no 
angel, nor heard any supernatural voice, but the angel does 
work with him successfully. 

So we believe in angel ministries today. We cannot see 
them, nor hear their voice with the outward ear, but we 
are warranted in believing that many of what we call mar- 
velous deliverances, "hairbreadth escapes," are the deliver- 
ances wrought for us by them. So we read," "The angel of 
the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him and 
delivereth them" (Psa. 34:7). Also, "For he shall give his 
angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They 
shall bear thee up, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone." 

Let your memory run back to some moment of great 
danger in vour life. As you see it to-day you speak of it 
with awe. Just at the moment when you gave up for lost 
came a strange deliverance. What was it? Oh, one of 
God's swift messengers who saved you. 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



81 



Whence come these strange impressions that cause per- 
sons to go home quickly, arriving just in time to save life 
or property, or to leave a carriage just in time to be spared 
from accident ? Or, as occurred in my own home, when the 
house took fire, in our absence, and went out itself, as we 
said? 

Whence comes so many of the strange deliverances of 
men and women in awful perils ? Are not these angel min- 
istries, a safe, intelligent answer? 

W e find this incident in the daily papers of New York : 
"Fire broke out in one of the old East Side dwelling 
houses of this city at four o'clock one morning. Down in 
the street stormed the firemen, coupling hose and dragging 
it to the front. Up stai'rs in the peak of the roof, in a broken 
skylight hung a man, old, feeble, and gasping for breath, 
struggling vainly to reach the roof. He had piled chairs 
upon tables and climbed up where he could grasp the edge, 
but his strength had given out when one more effort would 
have freed him. He felt himself sinking back. Over him 
was the sky, reddened now by the fire that raged below. 
Through the hole the pent-up smoke in the building found 
vent, and rushed in a black and smothering cloud. 
" 'Air, air,' gasped the old man. 'O God, water !' 
"There was a swishing sound, a splash, and the copius 
spray of a stream sent over the house from the street fell 
upon his upturned face. It beat back the smoke. Strength 
and hope returned. He took another grip on the roof just 
as he was about to let go. 

" 'O that I might be reached yet and saved from this hor- 
rible death,' he prayed. 'Help, O God, help !' 

"An answer shortly came over from the adjoining roof. 
He had been heard, and the firemen, who did not dream that 
anyone was in the burning building, had him in a minute. 

"Safe in the street, the old man fell upon his knees. 
7 prayed for water, and it came ; I prayed for freedom, and 

\ 

II s 



| 



82 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



zvas saved. The God of my people be praised!' he said, and 
he bowed his head in thanksgiving.'"' 

In the light of our text, who can doubt that an angel 
guided that stream of water, sent that fireman at the criti- 
cal moment to that old man, and then steadied him with his 
precious load down the swaying ladder to safety? 

The man did right to shout out his thanksgivings to 
God, for nowhere are we taught either to pray to or to wor- 
ship these angels, but still we owe our lives to their ministry, 
under direction of their God, and ours. 

But their spiritual ministries are incalculably greater 
than the physical and temporal. 

"We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against 
principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the dark- 
ness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high 
places." In the Scriptures we are taught that Satan and 
his angels have access to our world and that their purpose 
is to ruin men and women by tempting them to sin. The 
Christian life is a warfare clear through to the end. We 
strive not against an open, honorable foe, but against one 
who uses wiles, statagems, deceptions. So strong is he 
that our Lord warned us to "fear him." 

We have spoken of physical dangers, but these are 
small in comparison with spiritual perils. There are mo- 
ments when we are on the brink of some awful sin, to 
which, if we yield, we are ruined forever. We have but to 
turn to the murder by Cain, the pride of Korah ; the covet- 
ousness of Achan, the adultery of David, the denial by Peter 
or the treason of Judas to see the awful perils of a soul 
when beset by the powers of hell. 

And here it is that I believe the angels of God bring to 
us # their greatest ministry. They know these fallen angels 
and their powers of evil, as we know them not, and in many, 
many instances of which we will not know until they tell us 
by and by, do they "encamp round about and deliver us." 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



83 



You may have an enemy through no fault of yours. He 
has it in his power to ruin you. He has such influence with 
your employers that if he chooses a word from him will 
cause you to lose your position. You try to turn away his 
wrath, but he remains implacable. In your distress you go 
to God for deliverance, and God sends his angel to deliver 
you. If an angel could so work with Cyrus as to cause 
him to do a thing that he was very reluctant and unwilling 
to do, then your angel guardian can surely so influence 
your enemy, as at least, not to carry out his threats against 
you and finally deliver you altogether from his power. 

Oh, beloved ! I want you to carry with you the amazing 
providence and care and love of our Father in Heaven, who 
has arranged for us such guardianship through our pil- 
grimage from the cradle to the grave, for we are strangers 
and pilgrims here, as all our fathers were. God knew the 
perils of the way ; he foresaw that we could never make the 
journey alone, and in loving compassion he sends these 
unseen guides along to watch over our lives and minister to 
our wants. 

As I write these words there comes to mind this pathetic 
incident, as related in the Western Christian Advocate of 
recent date: 

"A friend of mine, more than eighty years old, greatly 
desired to visit the great Northwest, including Alaska, with 
one of the Raymond excursion parties. His son was fearful 
that, because of his age, he would not be able to endure the 
journey. But the old gentleman thought he was perfectly 
able, and determined to take any little risk. The son gave 
an apparently unwilling consent, but he took a splendid pre- 
caution. He employed a young man, paying his traveling 
expenses and an additional compensation, giving him in- 
structions to keep constant watch over his father and to 
minister to his comfort in every possible way. Arrange- 
ments were made for entertainment en route, so that they 



S4 THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 

had adjoining and connecting rooms, in order that the 
young man might have access to the old gentleman's apart- 
ment at any time. 

"So they started on the journey of more than ten 
thousand miles ; and, at the scheduled time, returned in 
safety. I met him a few days after he reached home, and he 
came toward me with uplifted hands, and face all aglow ; 
and with all the enthusiasm of a youth he cried : 'Only 
think ! I have been all the way to Alaska and back again, 
and have been well all the time. No harm of any kind came 
to us. And, most wonderful thing of all, I went alone! We 
had a very pleasant party. There was one young man who 
was especially attentive, and tried his best to make me 
comfortable. He looked out at every hotel to have a room 
opening into mine ; and he would frequently come in in the 
night to see Iioav I was getting along. But I went alone!'' 
He never knew until his dying day the harmless and loving 
plan which gave him not only companionship, but much 
needed care!' 

Just so it is with our journey through life. We think 
we are able to go alone. In fact, it is a fond boast of ours 
that Ave do make our way alone. We speak of our fore- 
sight, we say of some peril, "if I had not turned aside just 
at that moment I would have been killed," but I rejoice that 
God has done for us just what that son did for his aged 
father. He has anticipated our needs, and sends along his 
ministering spirits, all unseen by us, to guard our way. 
They drive away "the terror by night," they turn aside 
"the arrow by day," they neutralize the "pestilence" that 
walketh in darkness," and carry us unharmed through "the 
destruction that wasteth at noonday." 

"0!i, soul, hast thou forgotten 
The tender word, and sweet 
Of Him who left behind Him 
The print of bleeding feet? 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



85 



I never will forsake thee, 

Oh, child, so weary grown ; 
Remember, I have promised 

Never to leave the alone." 

Has the question ever arisen in your mind how shall I, 
when I drop this house of flesh, find my way out through 
yonder space, on through the extent of our solar system, on 
and yet on, past the far distant planets, to the home of my 
Lord? 

Mother, when your baby girl left your embrace and 
went to Heaven did you cry : "Oh, how can my tender little 
darling find her way to the arms of Jesus ?" Patience, dear 
heart. If our God is so great and so kind as to provide a 
ministry for his own, clear down to the brink of the river, 
he will not leave that ministry unfinished. 

It is our faith, and we found this faith on the Word of 
God, that angels meet the spirit in the moment of death 
and bear it company to its home in the skies. Nay more; 
despite the sneers of skeptics, we believe that some of the 
saints of God have heard the songs and been conscious of the 
presence of angels before they passed out of the body. 

Says Bishop Fowler : 

"I went once to see a dying girl whom the world had 
roughly treated. She never had a father, she never knew 
her mother. Her home had been the poorhouse, her couch 
the hospital cot, and yet, as she staggered in her weakness 
there, she picked up a little of the alphabet, enough to spell 
out the New Testament, and she had touched the hem of 
the Master's garment and had learned the new song. And 
I never trembled in the presence of majesty as I did in the 
majesty of her presence as she came near the crossing. 

" 'Oh, sir,' she said, 'God sends his angels. I read in his 
Word : 'Are they not ministering spirits, sent forth to min- 
ister to them who shall be the heirs of salvation?' And 
when I am lying in my cot they stand about me on this 



so 



THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS. 



floor, and when the heavy darkness comes and this poor 
side aches so severely he comes, for he says, 'Lo ! I am with 
you,' and I sleep, I rest" 



"Angels our servants are, 

And keep in all our ways, 
And in their watchful hands they bear 

The sacred sons of grace : 
Unto that heavenly bliss 

They all our steps attend; 
And God himself our Father is, 

And Jesus is our friend.'' 



— John Wesley. 





I 

I 



THE GREAT GOSPEL EXPOSITION AND THE 



EXPOSITION CITY. 

By Rev. Wm. N. McElroy, D.D. } Presiding Elder of the 
Jacksonville District. 

"And they shall bring the glory and honor of the nations into it. 
And there shall in nowise enter into it anything that defileth ; neither 
whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a lie, but they which 
are written in the Lamb's book of Life." — Rev. 21:26 27. 

Mankind have ever sought to bring together in one piace 
things esteemed, excellent and valuable. Ancient temples 
were filled with votive offerings of the most valuable sort ; 
silver, gold, precious stones ; trophies won in war ; skilled 
workmanship, and the finest products of the fields and vine- 
yards. So much was this so that the accumulation of these 
treasures tempted the avarice of bordering nations and led 
to wars waged for plunder, robbing one temple to adorn 
and enrich another. 

Sometimes this desire manifests itself in the formation 
of great libraries, like that which the Saracens burned at 
Alexandria, or the Bodleyan library at Oxford, England, 
or the Astor library at New York, or those which exist in 
almost every city on the globe, where are gathered together 
numberless and rare books and manuscripts, both ancient 
and modern, where can be learned all that men have 
thought along all lines of human investigation and pursuit 
through all the ages — jurisprudence, science, art, philosophy, 
theology, literature and all learning in its various forms. 

Sometimes this desire is manifested in accumulations of 
the highest and best art. In sculpture and painting and the 

87 



88 



THE GREAT GOSPEL EXPOSITION 



most finished products of brain and hand, of brush and 
chisel, as seen in the galleries which are the pride of all civil- 
ized nations. Such as are found in Dresden, Antwerp, 
Brussels, Amsterdam, Washington, London, Philadelphia 
and in the academy in Central Park, New York, and in that 
magnificent display in the Palace of the Louvre, in Paris, 
France, in all of which are gathered more or less of the 
finest works of the great masters, from Phidias to Powers, 
from Guido and Raphael to Holman, Hunt and Bierstaddt. 

Sometimes this desire is seen in great scientific collec- 
tions of rocks and fossils, metals and precious stones. 
Sometimes in botanical gardens like that instituted by 
Buff on in Paris, or the Royal Kew gardens in London, or 
our own Shaw's garden in St. Louis — gardens in which are 
gathered all rare trees and plants, all woods and flowers ; 
gardens like that which God planted eastward in Eden, in 
which he put innocent man "to dress and to keep it." 

Sometimes this desire is seen in gatherings of all rare 
and strange things — things of olden and of modern times, 
of barbarous nations and civilized peoples ; things rare and 
things common; the visible records which mark the onward 
march of the ages and the generations of men, and of races 
also, gathered from all lands, like as is found in the British 
Museum and our own National Museum in Washington 
City. 

In modern times the nations have sought to bring to- 
gether in expositions the rarest and best things of the whole 
world. The exposition in the Crystal Palace in London, 
our own Centennial celebration in Philadelphia, the great 
Columbian Exposition in Chicago, and the former and 
recent ones in Paris, France, are all illustrations of this 
desire and effort. In these were witnessed wonderful things. 
There was greatness of preparation, vast expenditure of 
means, magnificence and grandeur in the architectural de- 
sign and artistic finish of the buildings, in the variety and 



AND THE EXPOSITION CITY. 



s9 



fullness -of that which was gathered in these buildings — the 
finest and rarest things which have made the libraries, gal- 
leries, gardens and industrial and scientific collections of 
the whole world famous. 

All the things which man has thought out and designed. 
All those wonderful mental and moral conceptions which 
have been materialized in form by mechancial skill and 
handiwork. All the finest products of the loom and forge. 
All the inventions which have revolutionized the industries 
of the world and have unsettled the economic problems 
which had been supposed established for ages past and to 
come. The finest products of the fields and orchards; the 
finest workmanship of the shops ; all mechanism moved by 
steam and electricity ; rare things from beyond Cathay ; the 
result of man's achievements in civilized, half-civilized and 
barbarous lands ; the greatest achievements of brush and 
chisel, of printing press and pen, laces and tapestries, cloths 
and silks, and fabrics finer than the vestments of kings. 
' Crude things from Northern Eskimo. Ancient things from 
Egypt's ruins and Assyria's buried greatness. Rare things 
of ancient make and pattern. Heirlooms from ten thousand 
homes and from beyond the seas. Strange things from 
Turk and Arab, from Hun and Ruf, from Greek and Scan- 
dinavian, from Italian and Frenchman, Belgian and Dane, 
German and Briton, and that which surpasses all fabled 
wonders in the advancement of our own country. These 
are some, and only some, of the treasures and honors which 
the kings and nations of the earth gather into their exposi- 
tions and exposition cities (for these expositions are 
always held, and can only be held, in great cities like London, 
Chicago or Paris). 

But my text is a description delineating in part a city 
which transcends a thousand fold any city of earth. It 
transcends them in area — twelve thousand furlongs every 
way — the length and breadth and height of it being equal. 



90 



THE GREAT GOSPEL EXPOSITION 



It transcends all cities in the richness and beauty of its 
architectural designs and ornamentation. These in earthly 
cities are often surpassingly wonderful. All that genius 
can conceive in point of decoration and embellishment, in 
which on their foundations, walls, facades, columns, ped- 
estals, cornices, gables, doorways, porches and halls ancient 
and modern design is exhausted. Gorgeous dragon monster 
angel, beauty and grandeur— all ancient, medieval and 
modern conceptions, illustrating all modes of activity in the 
industries, commerce, arts and the varied pursuits of man- 
kind. But these are all made of crude material — brick, wood, 
iron, granite, marble. But this city is built of precious stones 
and gold ! Its walls are jasper, its foundations pearls, 
garnished with sapphires and emeralds and topazes and 
beryls and chrysoprases and chalcedonies. Ruby and onyx 
and amethyst flash and flame and tremble in the light. Its 
streets are paved with gold! Its palaces, like unto gold, 
clear as crystal. Its gates are pearls, its glory indescribable. 
The monk of Cluny failed to grasp it all when he sang of* 
Jerusalem the golden ! How pitiable the material and struc- 
ture and ornamentation of any earthly city compared with 
this ! Or the light which shines from electric flames, com- 
pared with that of this city, which ''had no need of the sun 
or the moon to shine in it," because illuminated with the 
presence and glory of the Lord God and the Lamb ! 

This glorious city descends from God out of Heaven ! 
Its wonderful structures are wrought out by divine hands 
in the shops of Heaven ! Its gems are mined from the 
mountains of God ! Its designs are the conceptions of the 
Divine Builder, who thought out and planned the universe 
and built up the architraves and archways of the starry 
steeps ! This glorious city stands peerless and alone — Jeru- 
salem the Golden, the glorious city of God. 

I need not stop to say this city represents the kingdom 
of our Lord Jesus Christ. It represents the corporate com- 



AND THE EXPOSITION CITY. 



91 



monwealth of saints, in which, the saved are citizens and 
heirs to thrones, principalities and powers in heavenly places. 
It represents the Church of Jesus Christ in its hroad and 
high sense, not in the narrowness and bigotry of sectarian- 
ism, which often seeks to make its own close corporation 
the limit of the sweep of the infinite scepter, and itself to 
monopolize all grace in earth or Heaven. But that true 
congregation of believers of all climes and ages. That 
divine city in which Jesus Christ dwells as its head, its 
Prophet, Priest and King, and where his laws and word are 
supremely believed, loved and obeyed — that city which is 
to stand while time shall stand, and then to be caught up to 
Heaven to know no end forever more ! 

In ancient times cities represented political powers. 
Athens is Attica; Jerusalem, Palestine," Nineveh, Assyria; 
Babylon, the Medo-Persian power ; Rome, the empire ! And 
so it is yet in a measure. London is greater than England, 
and Paris, Victor Hugo says, "is France — nay more, Paris 
is the universe!" So this city of God represents the divine 
government. It represents the power of the eternal God ; 
his laws, his will, his resources, his infinite glory and 
grace ; his benevolence, love, mercy and potency of blessing 
power among men. 

Cities are vast treasure houses, in which all that is best 
and most glorious and most valuable is gathered. They are 
reservoirs into which the riches of the nations flow. The 
wealth, the energy, the brain, the brawn, the culture gather 
there. A nation's genius, arts, inventions, commerce, indus- 
tries, learning and enterprise all reach their highest develop- 
ment in its cities. So in this city of God. All that is best 
and grandest in humanity, all that is wisest, purest, noblest, 
most blessed in the universe centers here. Things more 
valuable, things more excellent, things more beautiful and 
-more varied than those found in any city or any exposition 
of the world beside are gathered into it. It is a great treas- 



92 



THE GREAT GOSPEL EXPOSITION 



tire house indeed, a center of divine and holy forces, activ- 
ities, powers and products. It is God's great exposition 
city, in which the exposition of the universe is held and in 
which the rarest things on earth and in Heaven are on 
exhibition and will be forever. 

Permit me to call your attention to some of these treas- 
ures which the "kings of the earth" (that is the noblest and 
best of mankind), with their honor and their' glory are 
bringing into it. Not that I can catalogue or describe them, 
for thought and imagination and language utterly fail to 
portray them. But as far as my feeble powers will permit 
me let me name some of these rich and rare things which 
are being brought into this city and through it to our world 
to bless, elevate and ennoble our sinful race. 

And first among the honorable and glorious things 
brought into this city, and through it to the world, I name 
some of the indirect blessings coming to our world through 
the Gospel of Jesus Christ 

There is first : That quickening of the human intellect, 
which, through its development (made possible through the 
suppression of the vices of idolatry), has produced all that 
is glorious in the present civilisation and advancement of the 
world. Had it not been for Christianity world's fairs and 
expositions would be impossible. There could have been 
no expositions, because there would have been nothing 
worth exhibiting. We do not always think of this, but it is 
capable of the clearest demonstration. That which consti- 
tutes the "glory and honor of the nations" today is that 
which we call Christian civilization, as contrasted with the 
civilization of Pagan nations. Such civilization as is found 
in China or in Central Asia, or that which existed under 
the Montezumas in Mexico, or the Incas of Peru ; or even 
that ancient civilization which was the glory of Greece, 
Egypt, Assyria and of the Hittite kings. 

Did it ever occur to you that mechanical invention and 
industrial advancement, the utilitarian improvements of 



AND THE EXPOSITION CITY. 



93 



modern times, in labor saving machinery, in architecture, in 
the application of scientific principles to industrial pursuits 
and products ; steam and electricity as motive power, the 
steam engine and the dynamo, the telegraph and telephone, 
art in all its best forms and science itself, are the products 
of the Christian nations and of the Christian nations alone ? 
You do not find them in barbarous or heathen lands, save 
as they have been taken there by the Christian nations. 
These things only go where Christian civilization goes. For 
three thousand years China has remained stationary, and 
to-day is crumbling to pieces because of it. 

Why is it that the discoveries of the Occident did not 
occur in the orient ? Why were they not made in ancient 
Egypt or Assyria? Why have they only come into being 
where Christianity exists? The men in these lands are as 
acute of intellect naturally as other men. The same skies 
are over their heads, the same earth beneath their feet. 
Nature is ever around them, speaking her secrets to them, 
as to us. But they did not understand her, nor find out the 
good she offered to them. Not until the miracle worker 
came and aroused man by breathing into his spiritually dead 
nostrils the faith which beholds the unseen did he hear and 
understand what nature said. Then he lifted the veil which 
hid the face of God from him and in doing so nature's hid- 
den secrets were revealed. He seized upon them and they 
became the world's heritage. So railways, steam engines, 
electric motors, the lightning that lights and . talks, the 
spindles and wheels which spin and whirl, tapestries and 
cloths and silks and laces, comforts and luxuries, science 
and art, intelligence, morality and true religion all became 
the heritage of mankind. 

And all that is of worth and excellence in material con- 
struction and utility, glory and beauty came into this city 
built of gold and precious stones. 

But, further: The highest, truest and best art is the 
product of Christianity. Egyptian art was of the earth 



94 



THE GREAT GOSPEL EXPOSITION 



earthy. It was crude and massive. Its sculptures lack that 
which can only come through the conception of truth and 
beauty. Greek art had the conception of beauty, but not 
of exalted and pure spirituality. It had strength, force arid 
passion in it, but it was the strength, force and passion of 
the earthy. Much that disfigures the art of Christendom to- 
day is its sensuousness and animalism, and more of it. 
Ruskin tells us the result of the religious skepticism of the 
renaissance, which shows itself in the portrayal of the viler 
and baser passions of mankind, so much seen in the Dutch 
and earlier English, and later French painters, as illus- 
trated in the terrible and villainous cartoons of Dore. 

Christian faith is" the inspiration of all that is noblest 
and best in art. Indeed, there is, and can be, no high art 
without it. There must be the lofty and pure idealized con- 
ception, and no such conception can ever come save through 
the vision of faith. A true work of art, whether of design, 
sculpture or painting, must represent that which is high, 
noble and pure ; those lofty aspirations, sublime sacrifices, 
noble heroism* loyalty, truth and love, which are the glory of 
humanity, and not that which is low, vile and selfish. These 
high ideals are only beheld in their perfectness by the eye 
of a Christian faith. In the art found in this glorious city 
is none of that which is low and vile ; not that which ap- 
peals to the animal passions, the spirit of selfishness, cruelty, 
cowardice : not that which is gToveling - , debasing, but that 
which is elevating, refining and ennobling. 

But further, again: The most cultivated, refined and 
truly gentle society is the product of true Christianity, and 
is a treasure brought into and going of tJiis divine city. 
There is among men a genuine courtliness and gentility, 
and there is a counterpart of it. The one is of genuine ma- 
terial ; the other is shoddy. That which usually passes for 
"good society" is mostly of the sham kind. It is sensual 
and selfish. It is like the whited sepulcher — fair without. 



AND THE EXPOSITION CITY. 



95 



but vile within. It is hypocritical and cruel. It has veneer 
and polish, but it is cold and heartless. Like that of the 
courts of Catharine De Medici and Louis XIV., of France, 
it is fair and false, devoid of virtue and true gentility alike. 
True Christian society is fair without and genuine within. 
It is true and refined, removed alike from coarseness and 
weakness. It is intelligent and tender. The law of kind- 
ness is in its heart and purity upon its lips. It reaches out 
the ministering and helping hand. . It is strong, noble, pure, 
good. The men and women composing it are the kings and 
queens of our race. It is an example of the ultimate of the 
evolution of mankind. It is the "beautiful temple, with 
polished pillar, court, pediment and architrave." The 
Christian home is its "holy of holies," where the ark of 
covenanted loves lies under the outspread wings of angel 
guardians. Home is an Eden word. It carries the thought 
back to Eden days. It is a part of Paradise restored to man 
or allowed to escape to him ere the angel drew the ever- 
revolving sword of fire which guards the gates to the birth- 
right forfeited. In the true Christian home reigns an at- 
mosphere odorous as Eden in divine sweetness. Here the 
gentle ministries of household angels fan in gentle breezes 
the air of mutual loves and perfumes them with the odors 
of adoring hearts as they shake quivering from their 
downy wings ; the crystal light, which is a foretaste of the 
glory of a Paradise restored. Here is seen something of 
the human side of that love to each other, which is finally 
to fill the world when millennial glory shall wrap it in the 
mantle of peaeefulness and quietness forever. These are 
some of the glorious things indirectly coming to mankind 
through the treasures brought into this city of God. 

But not only treasures of this general kind are to be 
seen, but those of a more special kind also, as we shall see. 
The first of these I name is : The knowledge of the true 
God. Jesus said : "This is eternal life that they might 



96 



THE GREAT GOSPEL EXPOSITION 



know thee, the only living and true God." Life is the high- 
est of all earthly blessings — eternal life the highest bless- 
ing in the universe, and this is the knowledge of God. To 
know God is the banishment of all atheism, pantheism, 
polytheism, agnosticism from the soul forever. It is to rift 
these clouds and make glorious day for the troubled soul. To 
know God is to solve the perplexing problem of the cause 
of causes. It is to settle forever how things came to be. 
To know God is to see his wisdom in his works, the mani- 
festation of his thought, unfolding throughout the universe. 
To know God is for the child to measure up alongside of 
the Father, look into his face, and catch something of the 
fullness of his being. It is to be like him. To know God 
is to have the key which unlocks the mysteries of the uni- 
verse — the mysteries of history, of morals, of salvation. To 
know God aright is to solve all governmental, philosophical, 
economical, social, moral and religious problems. To know 
God aright is to know him as a ruler, a judge, a father. It 
is to know Jesus Christ as the "brightness of his glory," as 
the teacher, brother, friend, Saviour. And this knowledge we 
may all have. St. John said : "We do know that we know." 
St. Paul said : "God who hath caused the light to shine out 
of darkness hath shined in our hearts, to give us the light 
of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus 
Christ." Jesus himself said : " He that doeth my com- 
mandments shall know the doctrine." And again : "He 
that believeth in the Son hath everlasting (eternal) life." 
And this, Jesus declares, is the knowledge of himself. This 
knowledge enlarges and widens the human conception in 
everything. It spiritualizes the intellectual vision and 
touches, tinges and glorifies all things with the beatific 
sight. 

The religion of Jesus Christ, in its above mentioned re- 
sults, gives to the world the ideal man and woman realized 
in fact. These are the men and women of faith. Faith is 



AND THE EXPOSITION CITY. 



97 



that which makes heroes and victors. Unbelief is death. 
Doubt is paralysis. Your skeptic does nothing, dares noth- 
ing. Effort is emasculated. He is never the Watt who 
harnesses the steam, the Stevenson who puts the steam en- 
gine on wheels, causing it to travel; the Franklin who 
bottles the lightning, the Morse, who makes it write, the 
Edison who gives it a tongue. Unbelief discovers no Amer- 
icas, traverses no unknown oceans. Columbus believed in 
his theory of geography ; Washington in the cause of his 
country. The men who move the world believe in God and 
his Son, Jesus Christ. "This is the victory that overcometh 
the world, even your faith." The grandest human heroisms 
are not those witnessed upon earth's battlefields. They are 
not the kind seen in Nimrod, David, Alexander, Julius 
Csesar, Marlborough, Napoleon or Grant. The soldiers of the 
cross are the true heroes. Those who upon missions of 
peace brave all dangers, endure all privations, suffer all 
losses and count it but joy if they may win Christ and- bear 
the good news of life to dying men. Women who in the 
murderous atmosphere of China and in the jungles of Af- 
rica teach barbarous heathen the way of life and die joy- 
fully for Christ's sake and the sake of those they seek to 
save. 

But again : The religion of Jesus Christ gives to the 
world its only true philanthropy. Christianity alone gives 
the world a true altruism. All gentle ministries, all true en- 
lightenments, all kindnesses to the unfortunate and weak 
flow from it. It founds hospitals for the sick, homes for 
the indigent and aged, asylums for the blind, the mute and 
the insane. It gives us John Howards and Florence Night- 
ingales and Clara Bartons and Grace Darlings and thou- 
sands more who devote their lives to the relief of distress 
and the elevation of their fellowmen. It mitigates the 
cruelties of war ; is found where the pestilence rages, glad- 
dens the home of poverty, soothes the troubled heart and 



98 



THE GREAT GOSPEL EXPOSITION 



speaks its word of cheer to the desponding ; wipes the tear 
of sorrow away, smooths the hair and straightens the 
limbs for the grave. Like Jesus, with tender est heart and 
gentlest touch, it goes about doing good. But above and 
beyond this : 

The religion of Jesus Christ molds and fashions Christ- 
like character. This is its highest, noblest Avork. This the 
richest treasure brought into the city and shown to the 
world. The saint of God ! Whose presence is a benediction, 
whose spirit is angelic. So true, so brave, so tender, so pa- 
tient, so trustful, so loving, so heaven-like, so Christ-like! 
The glorious workmanship of the divine forces molding and 
fashioning character. God's jewels, to be set in the crown of 
his rejoicing. Earth's forces and teachers can produce 
nothing like these. Worthy gems to adorn the city of light 
and gold. Worthy to have the most prominent place in the 
exposition of the universe. Here, too, are seen saved souls : 
sinners transformed by divine grace, blasphemers changed 
into praisers, the drunkard made sober, the unclean pure, 
the brutal mild and loving, the lewd chaste, the doubting to 
believe, moral maniacs clothed and in their right minds, re- 
deemed souls "washed in the blood of the Lamb," wanderers 
reclaimed and travelers in the broad way turned heavenward. 
Oh, ye unbelievers, ye philosophers, ye men who spurn the 
religion of the Nazarene, who by learning and culture would 
save this world, bring forward your workmanship and com- 
pare it with this and see how utterly crude and worthless 
it is! 

But the chief glory of this city, and that which is brought 
into it, is it is all absolutely good, without a taint of evil. 
The city is built of gold and precious stones, and "nothing 
shall enter into it that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh 
abomination, or maketh a lie." Earth's cities, while the 
highest and best manifestations of the civilization of the peo- 
ples building them, and being treasure houses of their best 

.01c J 



AND THE EXPOSITION CITY. 



99 



things, are at the same time hotbeds of the worst vices and 
corruptions of humanity. It has always been so. And to- 
ddy the great question is how to banish vice and bring about 
civic righteousness, how to cleanse these Augean stables of 
sin, and enthrone honesty and decency where dishonesty and 
indecency flaunt themselves in the face of day. In our own 
Columbian exposition, and in that of Paris, amidst all the 
productions of genius and skill, born out of toil, suffering 
and pain— products that came through minds and civiliza- 
tions made possible through Christianity — in every building 
and on every hand, to the shame of America and Europe 
alike and to the disgrace of those whose greed put it there, 
was the accursed drink that "biteth like a serpent and sting- 
eth like an adder." Satan, in Paradise again, tempting, 
amidst its glory, the youth and aged alike. Drink, the worst 
foe of that which makes every good and lovely .thing known 
among men. But it is not so in this city. Nothing that 
worketh abomination is found here. Only things that are 
good, treasures of honor and glory! Are there evils in 
the world? They come not from the religion of Jesus 
Christ or from the true Church of God. Its work is to fill 
the world with these treasures and thus banish the evil, the 
sin and sorrow. Here, and now, the evil is mingled with the 
good, and that which excites and appeals to base passion 
and appetite, alas ! is everywhere. But when the time shall 
come when God's glorious city shall triumph, there will be 
none of these. 

But in conclusion : The highest glory of this city, and 
that which is gathered into it, will be seen when this holy 
Jerusalem is caught up into Heaven again. Then it will 
be glorified palaces of light and beauty, glorified bodies 
and souls of men, glorified songs and praises, glorified harps 
and anthems, glorified memories of glorified deeds, glorified 
robes, "washed in the blood of the Lamb." From every land, 
from every clime, of every age and everv race they shall 

LofC. 



100 



THE GREAT GOSPEL EXPOSITION. 



come, Adam and the last man. The thief on the cross, and 
he whose raiment is whiter than the light, who once walked 
amidst the seven golden candlesticks and held the stars in 
his right hand. Fields of opalescent light, plains fairer than 
ever bloomed with asphodel, as once did those of Tempe ; 
crowns and harps and anthems of glory; crystal seas that 
flame like glass mingled with fire; hallelujahs that are like 
the voice of many waters, and of mighty thunder ings. 
And treasured in all the mansions of crystal gold all the 
holy deeds, noble self-denials, sublime heroisms, resplendent 
victories and ministries of love and patience ! The finished 
skill of God's handiwork in human character and lives, as 
seen in the works which do follow those who "die in the 
Lord!" 

Dear reader, will you and I be among the number ? Are 
we citizens of this divine commonwealth? Do our hearts 
long as did that of St. Bernard when he sang : 

"Jerusalem, my happy home, 

My soul still pants for thee, 
When shall my sorrows have an end, 

In joy and peace in thee? 
When, Oh, thou city of my God, 

Shall I thy courts ascend, 
Where congregations ne'er break up 

And Sabbaths have no end?" 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 



BY REV. E. B. RANDLE, D.D., 

Pastor of First Church, Danville. 

"And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness : God 
was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, 
preached unto the gentiles, believed on in the world, received up 
into glory.'*' — I Timothy 3 :i6. 

The word "mystery" in its common acceptation means 
something above human comprehension — something hidden 
from human knowledge. But this is not the sense in which 
it is commonly used in the Scripture. In the Bible the word 
is often applied not only to those doctrines which had not 
been made known, but to those also which were in them- 
selves deep and difficult; to that which is obscure. The 
meaning in the text is not that the proposition which Paul 
affirmed was mysterious in the sense that it was unintelligi- 
ble or impossible to be understood, but that the doctrine 
respecting the incarnation and work of the Messiah, which 
had so long been kept hidden from the world, was a subject 
of the deepest importance. 

The word in the New Testament is used to denote those 
doctrines of Christianity which the Jews and the world at 
large did not understand until they were revealed by Christ 
and his apostles. Thus, the Gospel in general is called "the 
mystery of faith/' which it was requisite the deacons should 
hold with a pure conscience; and "the mystery which from 
the beginning of the world had been hid with God, but 
which was now made known through means of the church ; 
the mystery of the Gospel which St. Paul desired to make 
known"; "the mystery of God and of the Father and of 



101 



102 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 



Christ,'' to the full understanding of which he prayed that 
the Colossians might come. 

The same word is used respecting certain particular 
doctrines of the Gospel, as, for instance, "the partial and 
temporary blindness of Israel," of which mystery "the 
apostle would not have Christians ignorant, and which he 
explains. He styles the calling of the gentiles "a mystery 
which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of 
men, as it is now revealed unto the holy apostles and 
prophets by the Spirit." To this class we refer the well- 
known phrase, "Behold, I show you a mystery : we shall not 
all sleep, but we shall all be changed." 

That the Bible contains mysteries, we must freely admit. 
Paul says, "Great is the mystery of Godliness." A book that 
seeks to unfold the character and attributes of God, the 
compound nature of man; his relations, accountability, pos- 
sibilities and destiny; the great plan of human redemption, 
the ministration of angels, the resurrection of the dead, the 
origin of the universe, must necessarily contain many mys- 
teries. Take, for instance, the enunciation that "God is a 
spirit." How can even this definition be otherwise than a 
mystery? Who can form a definite idea of a being purely 
spiritual, but especially to comprehend the infinite? But all 
mysteries are not confined to religion. 

There are innumerable mysteries in the scientific world. 
The whole universe is full of mystery. The mind is utterly 
unable to comprehend the magnitudes, distances, forces, and 
velocities of our own solar system. But what are these com- 
pared with the thousands of clusters of self-luminous suns, 
which are numbered by the hundreds of millions, that twinkle 
in the distance ? 

Man himself is a bundle of mysteries. What mysterious 
processes in the digestion of our food, in the separation of 
the chyle, in the circulation of the blood, in its transforma- 
tion into bones, ligaments, tendons, muscles, membranes. 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 103 

arteries, nerves, tissues and brains. How mysterious the 
phenomena of the intellect, the union between mind and mat- 
ter, the connection between the will and the brain. It must 
be admitted that man knows very little about the secret 
springs of the complicated machinery within him. 

How strange that from the decomposition and decay 
of seeds that life and vitality are born ! That from filthy 
coils and muddy waters, and offensive impurity, vegetable 
forms of exquisite beauty and fragrant flowers of untold 
sweetness come to cheer and gladden our hearts ! It is 
hard for us to learn our own ignorance; and still harder to 
confess it, publicly. 

We cannot comprehend the eternity of God, His omni- 
presence and omniscience, and the manner in which He 
made man a free moral agent. The mysteries of the Bible 
cannot be explained away. Some have tried to reconcile 
the goodness of God with the existence of evil, by denying 
His wisdom. We are told that God would never create 
man to be forever unhappy. But they have not informed us 
how long He may permit him to be unhappy, as many of 
them are at present. Some who would have the Lord ap- 
pear well in the eyes of men, apologize for His acts in this 
fashion : "The dear, good Lord means well ; but He can- 
not foresee the results of His works. Other unknown agents 
resist His will and defeat His purposes." If this were true, 
the Creator would seem to stand in more need of our pity 
than of our reverence and fear. 

There has always been mystery in every department of 
creation, and probably there will always be mystery in every 
department of human investigation. That which is a mys- 
tery to one age is not all mysterious to another, and that 
which is a mystery to one mind is no mystery to another. 

In the progress of science, the solution of one mystery 
has been the discovery of another and greater mystery. 
There are three classes of foolish men in the world — the 



104 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 



one who hold to science with its mysteries and reject re- 
ligion because of its mysteries; the other, who hold to re- 
ligion with its mysteries, and reject science because of its 
mysteries. There is another class who reject both science 
and religion because they are both mysterious. 

We should not allow mysteries to intimidate us, for a 
mystery is only a fact or law not now known to us, but 
known to some other mind, or capable of being known by 
our mind or some other's. A mystery is simply the limit 
of our knowledge ; the measure of our ignorance. W e 
must not give up all scientific research and religion, for 
mystery exists everywhere and its existence is an objection 
to nothing. If we are continually surrounded with mys- 
tery in the material world, — if the animal, vegetable and 
mineral kingdoms are full of the unknown, — if we are beset 
with difficulties in all our scientific pursuits, in every field 
of investigation, — where is the reason or consistency in re- 
jecting the Bible because it contains mysteries? 

There is no antagonism between science and religion. 
Science and religion are as one. All true science is religious, 
and all true religion is scientific. In both religion and science 
what is mysterious in one age of the world is not a mystery 
in another. What was a mystery to Adam was plain to 
Moses, and what was a mystery to Moses was clear to Paul, 
and what was mysterious to Paul is plain to many men to- 
day. There is no progress in the earth and the Bible, but 
there is progress in science and theology. What we know 
not now we are to know hereafter. 

The mysteries of the Bible are what we might expect 
would come from God. The scholar hastens to libraries to 
solve difficulties and the physician searches with microscope 
to discover the secret germs of disease. The astronomer 
sweeps the starry heavens with his glass, studies the strange 
zodiacal light, or that auroral splendor which flings its 
flaming, palpitating banners on the northern sky. So the 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 105 

Christian must go directly to God to have his mysteries 
solved. The religion we have offered to us in the Bible 
is not easy even of apprehension until the soul is touched 
by grace. "Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of 
the kingdom of God, but unto them without he speaks in 
parables." 

The conditions of the plan of salvation are so plain that a 
child can understand them, yet the Bible does not teach 
everything, but because the Bible does not teach all things 
which some men wish to know, they look upon it as a fail- 
ure. They say, with a knowing look, "The Bible does not 
tell about the Trinity, and the incarnation; it does not tell 
where Cain got his wife; it does not explain Paul's thorn 
in the flesh, and how Jonah could be in the whale three days, 
and come out a better man than when he went in." Some 
ask, "Why did God create Adam, when He knew he would 
sin and fall." God knows why he created man, but He has 
not seen fit to tell us. If it had been important for us to 
know He would have told us. I am glad that God permits 
me to belong to His court, and not His council. I do not 
know why God permitted Galveston to be destroyed, but 
He knows. I cannot tell why God permits the father to be 
taken away from the family dependent on him. I cannot 
tell why God permits the mother to be taken away from her 
helpless little children, but I am sure He knows. 

I know that water always runs down hill, yet sap in 
trees seems to run up hill, but such a contradiction in nature 
does not shake my faith in the law of gravitation. Such 
contradictions abound in our knowledge of Nature ; but they 
exercise little influence over us except to accustom us to 
living in the presence of mystery and apparent contradic- 
tion. But, in religion, when, from the nature of the sub- 
ject, paradoxes should be looked for, there is no more fruit- 
ful cause of doubt than paradox. Two truths are set in ap- 
- parent hostility, two facts are so asserted as to seem con- 



106 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 



tradictory ; and the doubter at once reasons that religion is 
a fable which is not even cunningly devised. We must be- 
lieve that water runs down hill and also climbs up hill ; and 
the plain man accepts both the steam and the rain-laden cloud 
as facts. Because some men know only a part of the facts, 
and so cannot connect them and make a harmony, and 
cannot see where the facts meet and fraternize, they doubt ; 
but to a philosopher the plain man's trouble is easily under- 
stood, and explained. There is in religion just such a 
neglected region of knowledge where paradoxes disappear 
in the light of better knowledge. 

Most seeming contradictions by which men torment 
themselves into doubts, are easily set into harmonious rela- 
tions by a little reflection, and a little faith. Christianity 
is so profound and spiritual that it cannot be understood by 
carnal and ignorant men. It is not a dead formalism. The 
person of Christ is the center of it. Redemption, eternal 
life, divinity, humanity, propitiation, incarnation, judgment, 
Satan, heaven, and hell, — all these beliefs have been so ma- 
terialized, and coarsened that with a strange irony they 
present to us the spectacle of things having a profound 
meaning and yet carnally interpreted. "The efficacy of re- 
ligion lies precisely in that which is not rational, philosophic, 
nor eternal ; its efficacy lies in the unforeseen, the miraculous, 
the extraordinary." "Thus religion attracts more devotion 
in proportion as it demands more faith, — that is to say, as 
it becomes more incredible to the profane mind." 

The philosopher aspires to explain all mysteries, to dis- 
solve them into light. It is mystery, on the other hand, 
which the religious instinct demands and pursues ; it is mys- 
tery which constitutes the essence of worship, the power of 
proselytism. When the crpss became the "foolishness" of 
the cross, it took possession of the masses. And in our own 
day, those who wish to get rid of the supernatural, to en- 
lighten religion, to economize faith, find themselves deserted, 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 107 



like poets who should declaim against poetry, or women who 
should decry love. Faith consists in the acceptance of the 
incomprehensible, and even in the pursuit of the impossible, 
and is intoxicated with its own sacrifices, its own repeated 
extravagances. It is the forgetfulness of this psychological 
law which stultifies the so-called liberal Christianity. 

It is the realization of it which constitutes the strength 
of Catholicism. Apparently, no positive religion can sur- 
vive the supernatural element which is the reason for its 
existence. Natural religion seems to be the tomb of all his- 
toric cults. All concrete religions die eventually in the pure 
air of philosophy. So long, then, as the life of nations is in 
need of religion as a motive and sanction of morality, as food 
for faith, hope, and charity, so long will the masses turn 
away from pure reason and naked truth, so long will they 
adore mystery, so long — and rightly so — will they rest in 
faith, the only religion where the ideal presents itself to. 
them in an attractive form. When rationalists succeed in 
eliminating the mysterious element from Christianity it is a 
dead religion. 

Among all the mysterious doctrines of the New Testa- 
ment there is none more difficult to understand than that of 
the incarnation. The teaching of the New Testament is 
that in the fullness of time the Eternal Son assumed human 
nature, conceived by the Holy Ghost; that the mystery is 
revealed as a fact, no theories availing to explain it. It is 
the foundation of our Lord's redeeming ministry as well as 
the beginning of his earthly life. Christ was supernatural 
yet natural. It belongs to the freedom of the Divine Being 
that he can, in a certain sense, limit himself if he will, so 
he condescends to specific relations with the creature, though 
himself the absolute God. There is in nature a development 
from the inorganic to the organic, from the animal to the 
rational — a progressive evolution of life. This develop- 
ment is a progressive revelation of God. Something of 



108 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 



God is manifested in the mechanical laws of inorganic struc- 
tures ; something more in the growth and flexibility of vital 
forms of plant and animal ; something more still in reason, 
conscience, love, personality of man. But this revelation of 
God, this unfolding of Divine qualities, reaches a climax in 
Christ. God has expressed in inorganic nature his immor- 
tality, immensity, power, wisdom; in organic nature he has 
shown 'also that he is alive ; in human nature he has given 
glimpses of his mind and character. In Christ not one of 
these earlier revelations is abrogated ; nay, they are reaf- 
firmed ; but they reach a completion in the fuller exposition 
of the Divine character, the Divine personality, the Divine 
love. Christ, then, is the crown of nature. He completes a 
world otherwise incomplete. The world without Jesus Christ 
is an imperfect world. 

He unveiled God to us in a sense that Nature does not 
reveal him. "He that hath seen me, hath seen the Father." 
The apparent Christ reveals the unapparent God. There 
can be no true knowledge of God outside of Christ. The 
miraculous birth of the Saviour is one of the most prom- 
inent doctrines of the New Testament. Hitherto, the whole 
of Christendom, with the exception of the opponents of the 
supernatural, has been unanimous in holding it; but it is 
now being questioned or assailed by a theology which calls 
itself liberal and wishes to remain believing. Some consider 
it one of the distinctive and inalienable marks of evangelical 
Christianity; others who have already rejected the doctrine 
of pre-existence, give it up boldly. Others declare that it is 
a question of secondary importance, but that they still hold 
the orthodox view. 

The tendency of this age is to supersede evangelical faith 
with Deism. The world is recovering from the dangers of 
materialism ; agnosticism is an unsatisfactory resting place, 
and it is giving way to Deism as an ultimate compromise. 
Untrammeled by ecclesiastical or dogmatic restraints, men 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 109 

may, it is thought, reject the miraculous and yet believe in 
God. But theological liberalism cannot meet the moral 
and the spiritual needs of men. Those churches and those 
preachers have certainly been the most mighty in influenc- 
ing men and drawing them to Christ who have had the most 
sturdy faith and decided adherence to revealed truth. We 
should stand firm in our determined resistance to the en- 
croachments of any kind of liberalism which may be desig- 
nated as rationalism. A good man may have a very bad 
creed, but his goodness does not compel me to be silent 
about his errors. 

That the incarnation of the Son of God is mysterious no 
one can doubt, but because it is mysterious does not prove it 
to be true or false. The Universe is full of mysteries. If the 
Incarnation was the only mystery we might be justified in 
rejecting it, but it is not the only mystery. One of the most 
mysterious truths of the Gospel is the limitation of our 
Lord's knowledge ; especially when studied in the light of 
his essential divinity. In Luke it is said that "He increased 
in wisdom and stature," and in Mark he himself says "Of 
that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels 
which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father." Some 
base their denial of his essential Divinity on these passages. 
And it is amusing to what desperate straits some commenta- 
tors are reduced while trying to harmonize these passages 
with our Lord's Divinity. 

Some deny that Jesus did really increase in wisdom, but 
hold that he appeared to grow in wisdom as he gave evidence 
of his abilities. But they contradict the inspired evangelists 
point-blank, and we prefer to believe the evangelists. Some 
commentators say they cannot believe for a moment that his 
knowledge was imperfect and limited when he came to full 
age. But they overlook the fact that growth necessarily 
implies limitation and indefinite expansion. Some say that 
in the mysterious counsels of the eternal Trinity it was ap- 



110 THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION, 



pointed that the Son, during his earthly ministry, should 
not know, as a thing to be revealed to the church, the pre- 
cise date of his own second advent and the end of the world. 
But their explanation is as mysterious as the truth they try 
to explain. There are others who say that "As the Father's 
servant and messenger, he taught only 'what he was taught 
and commanded to teach." As the Great Prophet of God 
that was to come into the world, with the Holy Spirit given 
him without measure, he was infallible in all that he taught. 
"His infallibility," they say, "can be abundantly maintained, 
but his omniscience during the days of his flesh cannot." 
But we sit at his feet as the incarnate Son of God, yet we 
believe that he grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor 
with God and man, as the New Testament declares. I do 
not believe it because I understand it, but because the Book- 
teaches it. I accept it as one of the mysteries of Revela- 
tion. I believe what he taught as the teaching of God him- 
self by his Son. Whatsoever he heard from his Father he 
made known to his disciples. But the day and hour of his 
second coming he had not heard from his Father, and so 
did not make it known unto us. 

Christ speaks of himself as having come forth from the 
Father, and as the Revealer of the Father. He speaks of the 
Father as one with himself. The relation involved is alto- 
gether unique, and belongs to him alone. It is very different 
from that sonship which, through him, is allowed to all men. 
Not only the voice from heaven at his baptism, but the whole 
tone of our Lord's life and teaching proclaims him the only 
begotten Son of God. And so exalted is the position uni- 
formly claimed*, that we cannot but acquiesce in the saying, 
"Truly this was the Son of God." On the other hand he 
does not descend from heaven in his divine character and 
glory, but is born into this world like any other man ; lives 
a human life, grows in wisdom like any other child, speaks 
and acts in terms of humanity, not in terms of Divinity, 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. Ill 

shows no more knowledge than was current at the time, 
makes no disclosures of physics or medicine, expresses sur- 
prise, offers prayer, and, though the delegated Judge of all, 
does not know when the Day of Judgment will come. 

"All comparisons are, of course, utterly inadequate, but, 
perhaps, some faint notion of the meaning of the incarnation 
would be gained if we could fancy ourselves condemned to 
inhabit the body and soul of some tiny insect, tied down to 
its means of locomotion, to its sense of proportion, to its 
faculties, and only able to express ourselves, our thoughts, 
desires, and wants, by methods open to such a tiny insect." 

The incarnation of Christ, for nineteen centuries, has 
been the most vital question among all classes. Even unbe- 
lievers cannot let it alone, for they feel that their eternal 
well-being is somehow wrapped up with it. We believe 
Christ was a Supernatural Being, as well as natural, but 
we do not understand by Supernatural, something contrary 
to all means ; but that which is superhuman, and above the 
common laws of nature. We believe that the Supernatural 
comes within the domain of law, but it is a higher law than 
any with which we are now acquainted. All nature at first 
originated in the miraculous, and it is impossible for the 
world to get rid of the idea of miracle. Christianity teaches 
that miracles have been performed, and I firmly believe they 
have been. It miay be true that belief in miracles has fos- 
tered superstition. But, admitting such has been the effect, 
I would still ask, Where do we find men the most supersti- 
tious? What nations, and peoples, and tribes are most de- 
graded in this respect? How do the inhabitants of Chris- 
tian Europe and America compare, in this particular, with 
the inhabitants of Asia and Africa? Who are the most 
superstitious, the followers of Jesus or the followers of Con- 
fucius and Buddha? It should be remembered that the in- 
carnate Christ found man overwhelmed in superstitious 
bondage, and one of the greatest obstacles he had to over- 



112 THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 



come, and, even now, encounters among the pagan races, is 
the terrible bondage of superstition. 

Christianity recognizes the existence of a supernatural 
power, without the existence of which even science can- 
not account for the outgoings of the activities of the Uni- 
verse. Why, then, should Christianity be considered un- 
scientific because it teaches that this intelligent, super- 
natural author and executor of the laws of Nature has at 
certain times suspended or overcome those laws by the 
employment of higher laws for the accomplishment of cer- 
tain beneficent purposes. Christians are accused of follow- 
ing a blind faith because they believe in the supernatural. But 
is that faith which believes in the author of life and of the 
laws of Nature as the giver of our daily bread any more blind 
than the faith of those who think that God is so bound 
down by the laws he has established that he cannot act 
otherwise than in conformity with them? 

Before rationalists scoff at the blind faith of Christian- 
ity they had better think for a moment of the blind faith 
some of their so-called scientific theories require of all 
who subscribe to them. As to the charge that faith in 
the supernatural has retarded and hedged up the way of 
physical investigation every close thinker and careful ob- 
server knows that the charge is false. ''What countries have 
produced the greatest thinkers, and of what faith have 
they been? Were not Sir Isaac Newton, Michael Farra- 
day and Louis Agassiz devout Christians? Was not Dr. 
Franklin, who proposed prayer in the constitutional con- 
vention, and thus most impressively declared his belief in 
the duty of prayer as enjoined by Christianity? Not until 
Christianity, by proclaiming- and inculcating Peace on Earth 
and good will to men, and impressively teaching the super- 
iority of mind over matter, had paved the way for scien- 
tific investigation, did scientists begin to appear; and it 
is by the aid of the schools and the spirit of candid inves- 



THE MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION. 113 



tigation, fostered by Christianity, that the opportunities, 
qualifications, and facilities for thorough scientific inves- 
tigation have been brought within the reach of those who 
have become eminent in the field of candid, thorough in- 
vestigation." 

Christianity is belief in Jesus Christ ; not, however, belief 
in him as an historical, personage, but belief in him as 
Incarnate God. This belief involves an unreserved com- 
mittal of ourselves to him as the object of our devotion 
and the Lord of our Life. Such self-committal will be 
incomplete where the relationship to Jesus Christ is ob- 
scured, either by false ecclesiasticism, or by untheological 
philanthropy, or by academic intellectualism ; but the per- 
sonal relation is the root and ground of the whole matter. 
In this respect Christianity differs essentially from Moham- 
medanism and from Buddhism. Christianity, then, is faith 
in Jesus Christ as Incarnate God, with the necessary result 
of such faith — unreserved submission to him as our Lord 
and Master. 



WINNING SOULS. 



BY REV. HORACE REED, D. D., 

Presiding Elder of the Decatur District. 

"He that winneth souls is wise." — Prov. 11:30. 

No enterprise of greater importance than winning souls 
to Christ can possibly engage the thoughts, interest the 
feelings, or command the efforts of human beings. 

I. CALLED TO BE SOUL-WINNERS. 

Every Christian, however strong or weak, rich or poor, 
exalted or humble, is called to be a soul-winner. This was 
the method employed in bringing the first disciples to Jesus. 
Two men standing near John the Baptist heard him say, 
as they saw Jesus approaching, "Behold the Lamb of God." 
There was life in that look; for they followed Jesus, and 
came and saw where he dwelt, and abode with him that 
day. One of the two was Andrew, who was first an anx- 
ious inquirer, then a satisfied believer, and afterward an 
earnest missionary. After finding Jesus himself he next 
found his own brother Simon "and brought him to Jesus." 

The next day Jesus called Philip to follow him; and 
getting a new experience, Philip went forth and found Na- 
thaniel, and invited him to come and see Jesus. Bear in 
mind that these first soul-winners were not ordained min- 
isters, only ordinary laymen — weak, timid beginners, in a 
new work into which they had suddenly been called. 

The notion has become all too prevalent in the church 
that the soul-winning work is to be done mainly by minis- 
ters, evangelists, and deaconesses ; and that the laymen's 

114 



WINNING SOULS. 



113 



work relates mainly to the business department of the church. 

But since the inauguration of the twentieth century 
forward revival movement, ministers and members alike are 
realizing the great thought of personal responsibility as 
they have not in the past; and the conviction is deepening 
that this forward movement will mark the genesis of a 
revival movement unparalleled in our past history. Study 
the # Word in relation to the call to be soul- winners. As 
soon as the live coal touched Isaiah's lips and his iniquity 
was taken away, and his sin purged, he heard a call for 
workers : "Also I Jieard the voice of the Lord saying, 
Whom shall I send and who will go for us? Then said I, 
here am I, send me." Isa. 6 : 8. 

Hear the words of Jesus to the man out of whom the 
devil had been cast, and was "clothed in his right mind." 
He desired to stay with Jesus : "Howbeit Jesus suffered 
him not, but saith unto him, Go home to thy friends and 
tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, 
and hath had compassion on thee." Mark 5 :ig. 

Paul not only felt that he was called to be a soul-win- 
ner, but also to practice the law of adaptation that he might 
win the largest possible number. He says : "And unto the 
Jews I became as a Jew that I might gain the Jews ; to 
them that are under the law as under the law, that I might 
gain them that are under the law. . . . To the weak 
became I as weak that I might gain the weak; I am made 
all things to all men, that I might by all means save some." 
1 Cor. 9:20-23. 

Christians who have heard the call to be soul-winners 
and have obeyed the call are deeply interested in the wel- 
fare of others. A personal experience of salvation is natur- 
ally followd by an earnest desire and longing to have others 
share in the same blessed experience. See what the man 
did after he was cleansed of his leprosy. "But he went out 
and began to publish it much, and to blaze abroad the mat- 
ter, insomuch that Jesus could no more openly enter the 



116 



WINNING SOULS. 



city, but was without in desert places ; and they came to 
him from every quarter." Mark i 45. 

How tender and pathetic the words of Paul as he voiced 
his concern for his unsaved kindred : "I have great heavi- 
ness and continual sorrow in my heart. For I could wish 
that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, 
my kinsmen according to the flesh." Rom. 9 12-3. Again 
he said, "For the love of Christ constraineth us." 2 Cor. 
5:i4- 

Have you thought that it is the climax of cruelty for 
persons who profess to be followers of Jesus to be care- 
less and indifferent about the welfare of souls? He is a 
cruel man who sees a- fellow creature suffering or in bodily 
danger, and only mocks his misery by saying a few senti- 
mental words to him, or sings a few choruses or ditties 
over him and goes on leaving him in his perilous condi- 
tion. But he is more cruel who sees the multitudes of per- 
ishing souls all around him, and makes no effort to secure 
their salvation, but coldly and selfishly says, "Am I my 
brother's keeper?" 

Have you also thought that indifference to the welfare 
of others is criminal as well as cruel? Is not a man guilty 
of the crime of ingratitude who, having been so greatly 
loved and cared for, feels no care for others ? Is there 
no force in the divine declaration, "To him that knoweth 
to do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin." 

What bitter reflections will be experienced on the bed 
of death, if then the reason is awake, by those who were 
called to be soul-winners, but neglected their duty ! Would 
that all who profess to be followers of Jesus would realize 
that soul-winning is a necessity of a healthy and vigorous 
spiritual life. The soul that ceases to work for Christ will 
soon cease to possess Christ. The Christian who does 
not give out will soon cease to take in. Look at the Sea 
of Galilee, with its sparkling waters, fresh and pure and 



WINNING SOULS. 



117 



sweet. Why? Because that sea is always giving out as 
well as taking in. But look at the Dead Sea. It is dismal 
dreary and lifeless. Why? It has an inlet but no outlet. 
It takes in all it can but gives nothing out. That man 
who is constantly receiving, but never goes forth to do 
good to others, and never brings a weary, hungry, thirsty 
soul to Jesus, will shrivel, and wither, and waste as a fruit- 
less branch. 

II. PREPARATION FOR SOUL- WINNING. 

So many things are essential to be a successful soul- 
winner that angels might tremble to undertake a work 
of so great responsibility. Well may one who engages in 
this work say with the Apostle Paul, "And who is sufficient 
for these things?" 

Thought must be given to the work. Many who are 
loyal enough to the church to regularly attend the preach- 
ing services and Sunday school and pay their dues, say 
they do not know how to win souls to Christ. The reason 
is plain enough; they have never studied to qualify them- 
selves for the work. If farmers gave no more attention 
to growing crops and raising stock than some members 
do to winning souls, desolation and famine would follow 
in a very few years. 

If bankers and merchants gave no more attention to 
their business than many members do to winning souls, what 
a record of bankruptcies would be published ! If railroad 
men should give no more thought to the running of trains 
than many members do to winning souls, railroad disasters 
would be the chief items of daily news. 

Preparation for soul-winning involves a personal ex- 
perience of conscious salvation. Personal religion — the 
thorough, radical conversion of the soul, which involves 
the forgiveness of sins ; the new birth of the soul — a new 
creation in Christ Jesus— is the basis of all effectual work 
in winning souls. We cannot insist too strongly that the 



118 



WINNING SOULS. 



soul-winner must be a spiritual person; must be an object 
lesson himself, of the saving power of the Gospel. As 
Elijah won the people on Mt. Carmel by convincing them 
that the God of Israel was mightier than Baal, so must 
the followers of Jesus, in order to win men to be his fol- 
lowers, prove to them that God is mightier than self, or 
personal ambition, or love of the world in their own lives. 

Faith is a large factor in the soul- winner's preparation. 
A large element in the success of every man who has been 
pre-eminent as a soul-winner has been his faith in God, 
faith in himself through Christ, and faith in the message 
of the Gospel. Many have failed of success because they 
measured the task of winning souls, especially of great 
sinners, by their own weakness. Suppose Elijah had done 
that at Mt. Carmel, or David had done that as he con- 
fronted the giant, or Paul had done that when he went 
to establish Christianity at Ephesus and Corinth, or Luther 
had done that when he faced the combined powers of church 
and state arrayed against him, or Wesley had done that 
when the whole established church of England was arrayed 
against him. What victories would crownthe work of soul- 
winners today if we had such a faith as Paul who said : 
"I can do all things through Christ, who strengtheneth 
me." 

Give the Church such a faith as is voiced in one of 

Charles W esley's hymns : 
i 

"Faith, mighty faith, the promise sees, 
And looks to that alone ; 
Laughs at impossibilities, 
And cries, It shall be done." 

And then will we hear the shouts of new-born souls in all 
our congregations, and speedily millions will be won to 
Christ. 

Knowledge of human nature is an essential element of 
preparation for winning souls. Success requires the patient 



WINNING SOULS. 



119 



and prayerful study of the peculiarities of different persons, 
and of the same persons at different periods of life, in 
order to win them. The soul-winner must know the past 
of a man's life, in order to appreciate the present attitude 
of his mind and heart; his environment, his temperament, 
his prejudices, his struggles, his habits, his temptations, 
must all be considered. 

Jesus said unto his disciples, "Follow me and I will 
make you fishers of men." The fisherman, to succeed, must 
study the peculiarities of the different kinds of fish, and 
the kind of bait that will attract. So if we would win men 
we must patiently and thoughtfully study their peculiarities, 
and the best means of approaching them, so as to win them. 
When these things are studied as they should be, there will 
come some radical changes in the methods of church work 
and our churches will be kept open more evenings than 
they now are; more winning influences will be employed 
to attract people to< the church, and to win them to Christ. 

Love for souls is an essential preparation for soul-win- 
ning. Without it our efforts will be mechanical and power- 
less. If we have love for souls, we will be watching for 
opportunities to speak to the unsaved, and such opportuni- 
ties will come to us every day. How is one who does not 
feel this love for souls to get it? A love for souls, like 
every other grace of the Christian character, is the work 
of the Holy Spirit. If one is conscious that he does not 
possess that love for souls he should have, the wise thing 
to do is to go to God and confess it, and ask him by the 
Holy Spirit to supply the need, so he can be an effective 
soul-winner. 

We know, too, that feelings are the result of thoughts. 
Anyone desiring a feeling of love for souls, may have it by 
dwelling upon the thoughts adapted to produce such feel- 
ings, as : thoughts of the worth of the soul made in the 
image of God, thoughts of God's love in the gift of his Son 



120 



WINNING£SOULS. 



Jesus Christ, thoughts of the sinlessness of Jesus, the beauty 
of his character, his agony in Gethsemane and upon the 
cross, his intercession before the throne, his promise to come 
again and raise his children from their graves and take 
them to the mansions he is now preparing for them ; such 
thoughts will surely produce a love for souls, and a long- 
ing desire to win them to Christ. Oh, the winning power 
of love ! Arguments may fail ; eloquence may fail, gifts 
may fail, but who can withstand the power of love? This 
was the secret of Paul's power in winning souls. It impelled 
him to go from city to city, and from continent to conti- 
nent saying, ''None of these things move me." Every soul- 
winner has felt this constraining love to save souls. 

Another element in the preparation for soul winning is 
witnessing power through the Holy Ghost. In the last words 
of Jesus to his followers he said : "But ye shall receive 
power after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you : and 
ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem and in 
all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part 
of the earth." \Acts I :8. Every follower of Christ is 
called to be a witness to the great fact of conscious salvation. 
The character of a witness always determines the value 
of his testimony. 

So Paul taught when he described Christians as "living 
epistles read and known of all men." Phillips Brooks said 
truly, "The main method of meeting skepticism must be not 
an argument but a man." The atheist, Lord Peterborough, 
who visited Fenelon, said, "If I stay here much longer I 
shall be a Christian in spite of myself." No other argu- 
ment in all the wide realm of evidences is so powerful to 
convince, convict and persuade a soul to come to Christ 
as the argument of a holy life. And this all the follow- 
ers of Jesus may have through the baptism of the Holy 
Ghost. This is the supreme need of the church today as 
a preparation for soul-winning. Who were the men Jesus 



WINNING SOULS. 121 

told to tarry in Jerusalem until they were endued with power 
from on high? They had received what would seem to 
be a splendid and sufficient training for soul-winning. For 
more than three years they had listened to the very best 
of teachers — Jesus himself. They had been eye-witnesses 
to his wonderful works, death, burial, resurrection and ascen- 
sion. But one thing more was needed before going forth 
to fulfill the great commission, and that was Holy Ghost 
power. If those men needed this enduement, surely we 
ought to have it today. 

III. TIME-HONORED METHODS OF SOUL-WINNING. 

After a purpose has been formed to be an earnest soul- 
winner then a very important question arises, what are the 
things to be done, and how can one do them so as to win 
souls to Christ? 

There are three time-honored methods that always have 
been successful and always will be : 

ist. The preaching and teaching of the Word. See 
how Jesus honored the Word. He won his great victory 
over Satan by the use of the Word. In his preaching he 
often quoted the Word, and in this the preachers of ser- 
monettes might learn a valuable lesson today. 

Peter honored the Word in his preaching on the day of 
Pentecost, and the Holy Ghost honored his preaching and 
so convicted the people that they cried out, "Men and breth- 
ren, what must we do ?" 

See how Paul honored the Word. At Thessalonica, for 
three successive Sabbaths, he reasoned with the people out 
of the Scriptures. All the great revivalists have honored 
the Word. They had found it to be a hammer to break, 
a fire to burn, and a sword to pierce. It is the sword of 
the Spirit, quick and powerful ; it will cut to the heart, and 
cause men to cry out, "What must we do to be saved?" 



122 



WINNING SOULS. 



If the followers of Jesus today would be successful soul- 
winners they must rely more upon the word of God, and 
with clearness and earnestness present its teachings upon 
sin, repentance, faith, pardon, cleansing, adoption, and the 
witness of the Holy Spirit. Sinners must be shown, step 
by step, the way to Christ through the Word. Hence soul- 
winners must have clear ideas of the teaching of the Word. 
One of the greatest needs today is a revival of Bible study, 
with a view of becoming successful soul-winners. 

2d. Another time honored method is fervent, inwrought 
prayer. 

"The effectual fervent prayer availeth much." A great 
lesson many Christian workers need to learn today is the 
place and power of prayer in soul-winning. 

"But there's a power which man can wield 

When mortal aid is vain. 
That power is prayer, which soars on high, 

Through Jesus to the throne; 
And moves the hand that moves the world 

To bring salvation down." 

It is in answer to prayer that God gives his children 
power to win souls. Pentecost succeeded a ten days' prayer 
service. The great revivals of the past were not organized 
and manipulated by expert machine methods as many so- 
called revivals in these latter days are, but were the result 
of earnest, fervent prayers of faithful devoted souls. It 
has been said, not more beautifully than truthfully, that 
"the power of our prayers comes principally from this : that 
the Holy Spirit has in answer to our supplications allied 
himself with us ; unites his power with our weakness ; his 
prayers with our prayers; his cause with our cause, so that 
we become one with him. Thus by a mysterious commun- 
ion the worth of his prayers becomes the worth of our pray- 
ers ; the wisdom of his enlightens the ignorance of ours ; 
and the wealth of his enriches the poverty of ours." Shall 



WINNING SOUIyS. 123 

we be soul-winners in the future? That is for us to de- 
cide. We have the matter largely in our own hands. 
Listen to the words of Jesus :' "Whatsoever ye shall ask the 
Father in my name he will grant it unto you". 

3d. Another time honored method in soul-winning is 
personal effort with individuals. 

Dr. J. O. Peck, who was the greatest pastor evangelist 
in the Methodist Episcopal Church in his day, stated that 
of his converts he became personally acquainted with nearly 
every one of them before their conversion, having conversed 
with them in private before they publicly became seekers of 
salvation. The importance which he attached to personal 
effort is seen in this statement which he made: "So great 
is my conviction of the value of personal effort as the re- 
sult of a life-work in winning souls, that I cannot empha- 
size this method too strongly. If it were revealed to me 
by the Archangel Gabriel that God had given me the cer- 
tainty of ten years of life, and that as a condition of my 
salvation I must win a thousand souls to Christ in that 
time, and if it was further conditioned to this end that I 
might preach every day for the ten years, but might not 
personally appeal to the unconverted outside of the pulpit; 
or that I might not enter the pulpit during those ten years, 
but might exclusively appeal to individuals, I would not 
hesitate one moment to make the choice of personal effort, 
as the sole means to be used in the conversion of the 
thousand souls necessary to my salvation." 

Dr. Peck tells of one pastor who induced ten men and 
twenty women to take up this work prayerfully and earn- 
estly. The next Sabbath there were fifty-seven persons at 
church who had not been accustomed to attend as the direct 
fruits of that work. The second Sabbath there were a hun- 
dred and fifty strangers present, and at the close of the 
evening service twenty of them arose for prayers. 

Personal work is of the utmost importance in winning 
men to Christ. The church is learning by a sad experience 



124 WINNING SOULS. 

i 

that brilliant talents in the pulpit, elaborate machinery, ar- 
tistic music, putting men of wealth into official positions 
chiefly on account of their money will never bring the 
masses to attend the services, and crowd our altars with 
penitent seekers of salvation. 

See how Jesus emphasized the importance of personal 
effort in the case of the leper, and of Nicodemus, and of the 
woman of Samaria, and in his parable of the lost sheep. 

To all who are anxious to win souls opportunities will 
come, every day, to invite some one to the preaching serv- 
ice or Sunday-school or social service. This is a work 
anyone can do. In your place of business, in your social 
calls, in your lodging or boarding house, you may give in- 
vitations that will turn many away from sin and win them 
into a better life. You can also send cards of invitation 
to those you cannot see, and in your correspondence with 
friends you can write a few words that will win a soul to 
Christ. A great secret in soul-winning is to be always 
ready to speak a word when an opportunity is presented. 

IV. MOTIVES ACTUATING SOUL-WINNERS. 

They are many. I will mention only four : 
1st, The worth of the soul. 

"What is the thing of greatest price 

The whole creation round? 
That which was lost in Paradise, 

That which in Christ is found. 
The soul pf man- Jehovah's breath, 

That keeps two worlds at strife; 
Hell moves beneath to work its death, 

Heaven stoops to give it life." 

Think of the worth of the soul in view of its wonderful 
faculties and capacities, of its power of thought, its crea- 
tions of genius, its marvelous achievements, its light of rea- 
son, its voice of conscience. Think of its power to acquire 
knowledge. Its aspiration knows no bounds. It would 



WINNING SOULS. 



125 



grasp every object and explore every realm. Nature and 
revelation, man and angels, and even God himself are ob- 
jects which the human mind would contemplate and com- 
prehend. If Sir Isaac Newton had lived until today and 
been the same diligent student all the intervening years, 
still he might say as he did near the close of his life : 
"I seem to be like the little boy playing along the seashore, 
gathering in now and then a prettier pebble or smoother 
shell while the great ocean is still undiscovered before me." 

Think of the worth of the soul in the light of its immortal- 
ity. It has a birthday but no dying-day. All the destructive 
forces in the universe cannot annihilate it. The one word 
that can be applied to the duration of the human soul of great- 
est significance is the word ETERNITY. And what is 
eternity? Wise men and sages have given their answers. 
The answer given by a Sunday-school boy to his teacher has 
most impressed me. He said, "Eternity is the life-time of 
the Almighty." 

Think of the worth of the soul in the light of the amaz- 
ing price which was paid for its redemption. Ponder the 
great question propounded by the Lord Jesus who left the 
shining realms of glory and came to earth to be made a 
sacrificial offering for sin and therefore knew how to esti- 
mate its value : "What shall it profit a man if he gain 
the whole world and lose his own soul, or what shall he 
give in exchange for his soul?" Behold the agonies of 
the Lamb of God in Gethsemane, and his sufferings on Cal- 
vary; and if after you have heard his agonizing prayer in 
the garden and his dying cries on Calvary, not only because 
you 

"See from his temples, hands and feet 
Sorrow and love flow mingled down" ; 

but because he experienced a broken heart, you can fathom 
the depth, and span the length, and soar to the height of 
his sufferings for the sin of the world, then may you be 
able to appreciate something of the worth of the soul. 



126 WINNING SOUIvS. 

2. Another motive actuating soul-winners is the lim- 
ited time for religious work. 

Soon the night will come which will end our opportuni- 
ties for soul-winning work. The time is so short it ought 
to be improved with the most anxious care and diligence. 
What is the period of our life-work? "A handbreadth," "a 
shadow/' and it is the only time allotted us for soul-win- 
ning. 

"So should we live that every hour 
May die as dies the natural flower, 
A self-reviving thing of power ; 
That every thought, and every deed, 
May hold within itself the seed 
Of future good and future need." 

3d. Another motive is assurance of success. Study 
the promises : "They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. 
He that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, 
shall doubtless come again rejoicing bringing his sheaves 
with him." Ps. 126:5-6. 

"For as the rain cometh down and the snow from heaven 
and returneth not thither but watereth the earth, and mak- 
eth it to bring forth and bud that it may give seed to 
the sower and bread to the eater. So shall my word be 
that goeth forth out of my mouth ; it shall not return unto 
me void ; but shall accomplish that which I please and shall 
prosper in the thing whereto I sent it." Isa. 55:10-11. 

"Your labor is 'not in vain' in the Lord." 1 Cor. 15:58. 
The soul-winner has the promise of the personal presence 
of Jesus, "Lo, I am with you alway." 

How often when thinking of my weakness and many 
imperfections have I said, "Can I claim this promise?" 
Then as I have thought that among those who heard the 
promise of Jesus were Peter, who denied him, and Thomas, 
who doubted, and others who followed afar off, then my 
heart takes courage. How much we have had to encour- 



WINNING SOULS. 



127 



age us as we have seen the transforming and regenerating 
power of the Gospel wrought through human instrumen- 
tality. We have seen men steeped in sin until they were 
standing on the verge of ruin. We have seen loving and 
earnest Christian workers go to them with the Gospel mes- 
sage of love and tell them that Jesus came into the world 
to save just such sinners. They bowed as penitents, turned 
away from their sins, confessed Christ as their Savior, 
commenced reading the Bible, associated themselves with 
the followers of Jesus, and with a rich, satisfying and joy- 
ful experience they went forth to bring others to Jesus. 

4th. Another motive is the future rewards of soul-win- 
ners : "And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness 
of the firmament, and they that have turned many to right- 
eousness -as the stars forever and ever." Dan. 12 13. 

Jesus our prophet, priest and king, who is also our elder 
brother, and who is now our interceding Savior, and is 
fitting up mansions for us, is coming again, and when he 
shall appear we shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth 
not away. When Jesus comes in his glory and all N the 
holy angels with him and shall call the millions of his 
followers from their graves and assemble them before his 
throne, then shall every soul-winner hear those all com- 
pensating words : "Well done, good and faithful servant, 
enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." 



T^E ENLARGEMENT OF OUR HEAVENLY ES- 
TATE. 



BY REV. J. B. WOLFE, 

Pastor at Beardstown. 
"But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven." — Matt. 6 :2c 

Desire for gain springs up spontaneously in the human 
heart, for it has its foundation in an innate condition of 
our ( nature. Its presence is not necessarily evidence of 
any defective quality of character : it may develop into' covet- 
ousness ; it may abide in a heart full of the spirit and sun- 
shine of heaven. Man's desires and ambitions are such 
that the world can never fill them, and, in the pursuit of 
cheir gratification, he feels the pressure of time's limitation. 

To regulate the desire for gain, and to adequately supply 
the demands of his nature, God has invited man to try 
the possibilities of heavenly accumulations. 

Pertinent to this we have in the text 

The Duty Enjoined — "Lay up for yourselves treasures 
in heaven." The duty implies, 

i. The Law of Increase. How can increase be secured 
in any interest, without regard to some law of development ? 
This law is everywhere manifest. It is seen, (i) In the 
vegetable world. How is a harvest of golden grain 
and rich fruitage secured? By submission to certain con- 
ditions. The soil must be prepared ; the seed sown ; the 
stalk cultivated. Will the little sprout ever develop into a 
tree? That depends upon its soil and atmosphere and light; 

128 



I 



• ENLARGEMENT OF OlTR HEAVENLY ESTATE. 



129 



and in putting forth its leaves, if it does not open through 
them millions of mouths to drink the surrounding nourish- 
ment, it will not only fail to grow, but soon perish. 

The law of increase applies to, (2) The world of busi- 
ness. Here increase comes by the careful and constant use 
of opportunities and the employment of appropriate means. 
To gain wealth one must rise early, watch closely, and 
save carefully every day. Industry, tact and frugality are 
necessary to secure wealth. When these conditions are met, 
wealth is resultant. 

This is equally true (3) In the World of Thought. 
How does one develop his ability to think and increase his 
capital of knowledge? By a proper regard to psychologi- 
cal conditions, and the laws for mental development. He 
gains a knowledge of the letter, forms the word; constructs 
the sentence; solves the simple problems that come first to 
the mind, then reaches out for all that lie in the field of 
possible discovery. Study ! As it is in the vegetable, busi- 
ness, and intellectual worlds, so it is (4) In the Realm of 
the Spiritual. If a man would lay up treasures in heaven 
he must respect the laws of spiritual accumulation and 
wealth. 

Strange that anyone should think that he can act less 
intelligently in relation to his spiritual than in other inter- 
ests and expect to reap a similarly abundant harvest to 
what he would have gained by greater diligence and care ! 
To lay up treasures in heaven implies, 

2. The Possibility of Increasing Our Heavenly Estate. 
The text is a plain declaration of a human possibility. Be- 
hind it is Christ himself. It appears, however, from an- 
other fact : That man is saved on a different principle than 
that on which he is rewarded. 

How are men saved ? By grace through faith — by grace 
secured by faith, which produces a fitness for heaven. 
Hence "By grace are ye saved through faith .... not 



130 ENLARGEMENT OF OUR" HEAVENLY ESTATE. * 

of works." Eph. 2:8-9. "Who hath saved us . . . not 
according to our works, but according to his grace." 2 
Tim. 1 :g. Grace and salvation are always companion words 
in the Scriptures, when salvation means the deliverance from 
sin. 

If we dwell at last in the realm of the blessed; if we 
join in offering ascriptions of praise with the redeemed in 
glory; if we shout with the higher intelligences, "Thrice 
holy, Lord God of hosts, heaven and earth are full of Thy 
glory," it will be because grace has refined our hearts and 
we are thus made suitable for the heavenly inheritance. 

On what principle are men rewarded ? Ah ! this is quite 
a different subject, too often confounded with the other. 

When the Scriptures speak of rewards it is always 
according to works. Thus it is said, "For the Son of Man 
shall come in the glory of the Father with his angels : and 
then he shall reward every man according to his works." 
Matt. 16 127. Here we have two more companion words— 
rewards and works. These are not confounded with the 
other companion words, because they belong to a different 
subject. 

That is a marvelous statement of St. Paul in 1 Cor. 
3:13-15, which encircles the entire subject. He says: 
"Every man's work shall be made manifest; for the day 
shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by. fire ; and 
the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. 
If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss ; 
but he himself shall be saved, yet as by fire." There is 
no confusion of ideas or words in this. It is clearly taught 
that, while a man may be saved — saved if he can stand 
the test of character — yet suffer loss in his reward, if his 
works are burned. This is plainly because salvation and 
rewards come from different principles. Are men dream- 
ing that they can live for years in neglect of their spir- 
itual interests, then repent and secure the same heavenly 



ENLARGEMENT OF OUR HEAVENLY ESTATE. 131 



state they would have done by a whole life time of devo- 
tion to God? Do they think they can live a year in sin 
and not sustain an eternal loss? Every day of neglect 
and sin lowers the temperature of joy forever. There is 
no such confusion of notions in the business transactions 
of this world. If by careful industry and frugality, one 
may save $2,000 per annum, then at the end of ten years 
he would have $20,000; neglect for two years would re- 
duce the amount to $16,000. Are not the conditions of 
heavenly accumulations as inexorable? 

Some say that the parable of the laborers, where "they 
all received a penny alike," teaches equality of heavenly 
reward. . This view is a misapplication of the parable. In 
fact, is there any justice in giving any equally skilled and 
diligent laborer, who toils all the day, no more than him 
who labors from 3 p. m. until sundown? The Lord never 
taught such unwarrantable business transactions. The par- 
able does not refer to rewards in heaven, but to the privi- 
leges and blessings of the Gospel. Though the Gentiles 
came in at the eleventh hour of the long day of expectation 
of the coming of .the Redeemer, they should have the bless- 
ings of the Gospel as well as the Jews; that you and I are 
as much entitled to them as any son of Abraham. This 
explanation of the parable comports with facts and is in 
harmony with the principles of Christianity, rather than 
the distorted notion that it teaches the inequitable thing 
of equality of rewards. Sin is not so harmless that any 
one can defer his return to God a day, without sustaining 
an eternal loss. 

If any man is saved at the close of this life, his reward 
must be small. Can the reward of the penitent thief be 
equal to that of Abraham, or Moses or Paul? Though 
he forfeited his right to go over into the Promised Land, 
Moses stands high in the administration of the heavenly 
world. He led the Israelites out of Egypt; he stood upon 



132 ENLARGEMENT OF OUR HEAVENLY ESTATE. 

the old rock-ribbed and thunder-riven mountain to receive 
the law from the hand of the Eternal; he led the hosts of 
Israel through the wilderness, and prepared them for the 
promised inheritance. With eye undimmed and natural 
strength unabated, from Mount Nebo he gazed upon the 
Promised Land. He saw Gilead until it ended far beyond 
his sight in Dan ; the distant hills ; the land of Judah stretch- 
ing on to the sea; the desert in the south, and at his feet, 
though far beneath, was the plain of Jericho and the city of 
palm-trees. He saw it all, and died. Why, death? His 
vision was undimmed and his natural strength unabated. 
He had by his disobedience forfeited his right to go over 
into Canaan. Though his death taught Israel and the world 
that God cannot look upon sin with allowance, though it be 
in a leader, yet if Moses went to heaven and received all 
that was possible by a prolonged life of usefulness, what 
loss did he sustain from his transgression? That he was 
saved, the Scriptures declare. 

On the principle that man is rewarded according to his 
works, had he gone over into the Promised Land, driven out 
the enemy and settled the people in their lots, he would have 
gained so much more as the reward of faithful and efficient 
service of God. This is sufficient to induce the belief of the 
possibility of laying up treasures in heaven ; that, — 

"Glorious is the state 
liv'n of the lowest there; but saints more high 
The sovereign throne his greater servants wait." 

The duty implies 

3. Conditions of Such Increase. 
They may be briefly outlined as 

(1). The Development of Christian Character and of 
Christian Usefulness. 

How are men qualified for certain vocations here? By 
study and practice. General Grant, while attending the 
military academy at West Point, studied and practiced the 



ENLARGEMENT OF OUR HEAVENLY ESTATE. 138 

rules of military life and the processes of military tactics. 
He then laid the foundation of so much treasure for the 
future, and when the proper time came he reaped a corre- 
sponding harvest. 

There are different official positions and administrations 
of government in the heavenly world as truly as there are 
here. We shall there be finite, need instruction respecting 
duties to be performed, discoveries to be made and knowl- 
edge to be gained. The fact of our being finite, and environed 
by an illimitable universe, suggests the thought of the pos- 
sibility of unending progress. The angels advance in 
knowledge by similar processes of intellect to that by which 
we learn. This is seen in the declaration that "they desired 
to look into these things," which shows not only mental in- 
tent, but mental perplexity. After we have been in heaven 
a thousand years we shall know vastly more than when we 
first stepped upon its heavenly ways. Differences in posi- 
tion there are taught in the parable of the talents — the faith- 
ful servants were made rulers over cities, according to the 
use of their talents which implies, at least, governmental 
relations and different positions. 

The Sermon on the Mount teaches that certain condi- 
tions and duties will bring great reward in the resurrec- 
tion of the just. 

Another condition of enhancing our heavenly estate is 

(2) Doing Good. "We are created in Christ Jesus unto 
good works. Do good unto all men, especially to them who 
are of the household of faith." Every sincere prayer of- 
fered, every kind word spoken, every good wish ex- 
perienced; every tear shed in life's pathetic and benevolent 
labor; every act of fidelity to God, or of good to man, shall 
be rewarded. 

On the ground that many of these acts are performed 
by sinners, do they not receive a reward? Is it not de- 
clared that a cup of cold water given to the thirsty brings a 



134 ENLARGEMENT OF OUR HEAVENLY ESTATE. 



reward? Yes, but the rewards of the benevolent deeds of 
the sinner cannot be the same as those of God's servants. 
They do not emanate from the same motive and character. 
The sinner has his reward in securing the end designed by 
the benevolent act, or in the gratification such an act pro- 
duces. 

This principle is set forth in Matthew 6:1-6: "Take 
heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of 
them; otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which 
is in heaven. Therefore, when thou doest thine alms do not 
sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the 
synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory 
of men. Verily I say unto you they have their re- 
ward." * * * 

The Christian has more than the gratification that 
springs up in the heart in the doing of a kindly act for 
his motive is different. He performs his deeds of benevo- 
lence not only out of sympathy with the needy and suffer- 
ing, but out of respect and love for God. 

In response to a demand of soldiers during the late 
Civil War in this country, a woman, whose husband and 
sons were in the opposing army, said : "My dearest 
friends are in the war against you, and my sympathies are 
with them and their cause. I pray for their triumph over 
you. However, I cheerfully divide my bread with you, 
for my blessed Saviour teaches trie : Tf thine enemy hun- 
ger, feed him/ This I do in his name and pray that he 
may direct us all into the right." Here is a motive that 
stretches on to the everlasting throne, and shall have re- 
ward in the land of ineffable glory. How carefully the 
inspired writer states the conditions on which the cup of 
cold water has a reward ! "A cup of cold water given in 
the name of a disciple, because ye are Christ's has its re- 
ward." 

Never did we so clearly see before the beauty and glory 
of this subject, as in the case of one whom we were called 



ENLARGEMENT OF OUR HEAVENLY ESTATE. 135 



to counsel. She said: "I am dying. My life has been 
largely one of sin. I have attended the church in its vari- 
ous services until I know its songs and am familiar with 
much of the scriptures. They all condemn me and I am 
lost." When we attempted to direct her to the Saviour, 
the sinner's friend, she confounded us with her quotations 
from the scriptures and church literature. We sat in silent 
prayer for a moment. Then the thought came to us, and 
we told her that while all she said was true, "yet, remember, 
that we are saved from a different standpoint than that 
from which we are rewarded." For the first time during 
the conversation she became thoughtfully silent, then, with 
a look of surprise, said: "I never heard that before. How 
is that?" We replied: "We are saved by grace through 
faith; we are rewarded according to our works." We can 
never forget the sudden change that came into her face. 
Her lips quivered with emotion and tears came into her 
eyes as she lifted her thin white hands from her sides and 
shouted : "Glory to God, I can be saved, but oh, what a 
loss I shall sustain because of a neglectful and sinful life !" 
To our astonishment she then quoted with a pathos that 
deeply moved all present the words : 

"Must I go and empty handed, 

Thus my dear Redeemer meet? 
Not cne day of service give Him, 
Lay no trophy at His feet?" 

Though she lived two or three weeks longer, she never 
wavered in her faith or hope, and the last words she ut- 
tered on earth were : 

'Til soon be at rest over there." 

Different with the lifelong servant of God ! "He that 
goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall 
doubtless come again, with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves 
with him." — Ps. 126:6. 



136 ENLARGEMENT OF OUR HEAVENLY ESTATE. 

While the Christian is, day by day, laying up treasures 
in heaven, the sinner is heaping up wrath against the day 
of wrath. 

It is not so much what we leave in the world as what 
we take with us, that shall enlarge us in the regions of 
ineffable bliss. "Their works do follow them" means "go 
with them to enrich them in glory." 

When the many times millionaire came to die he asked 
his pastor to sing for him. "What shall I sing?" inquired 
the pastor, to which he responded: 

"Come, ye sinners, poor and needy, 

Weak and wounded, sick and sore ; 
Jesus ready stands to save you, 
Full of pity, love and power." 

Who does not know, who cannot easily see, that every 
earthly pleasure and possession is held with an uncer- 
tain tenure? Friends, fame, fortune go like the morning 
dew before the summer sun. The beautiful creations of 
genius, the most magnificent structures of art, "the cloud- 
capped towers and gorgeous palaces" are under the pulver- 
izing influence of time, and decay while we look at them. 
There is rust for the purest gold; there is tarnish for the 
brightest steel ; there is a worm for the most beautiful 
flower. We lay all earthly estate down at the grave. If 
all that a man has is in this world, when he dies he becomes 
a total and eternal bankrupt. 

Not so with heavenly things; they are not under the 
dominion of decay. They grow brighter and better as 
time flows on. Whether possessed of much or little of 
this world, if he has laid up treasures as the years have 
gone by, when a man dies he enters upon an inestimable 
inheritance, covered with glory. What enterprise involves 
such character and blessing, or offers such inducements to 
investors? "Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven." 
Amen. 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



BY A. C. BYERLY, D.D. 

Pastor First M. E. Church, Lincoln, III. 

"And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and be- 
tween thy seed and her seed ; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt 
bruise his heel." — Gen. 3-15. 

This remarkable passage has long been regarded as the 
original promise. The Prot, Evangelium, of first Gospel. 
As all the potentialities of the mighty oak are contained in 
the acorn, so the whole history of redemption, through all 
the ages of futurity and all the incidents of its unfolding, 
are comprehended in this germinal prophecy. 

A great disaster had befallen tne newly created race. 
Sin had broken in upon Eden and the earth, and ages of 
unspeakable anguish and wretchedness and turmoil and 
despair must follow in its train. But simultaneously with 
the triumph of Satan came the promise of his downfall. 
The woman has been deceived by that old serpent, the 
devil, and her posterity involved in ruin, but frorn her 
posterity, her champion, and the champion of the race shall 
appear. Satan shall be overthrown, his kingdom destroyed 
and righteousness re-established on the earth. All this 
is implied in the promise. Long ages of tumultuous his- 
tory, of unrecorded struggles and conflicts, of deathless 
aspiration and immortal hopes are crowded into this origi- 
nal germ, the seed thought of all history and the premo- 
nition of human destiny. It is not to be supposed that the 
nature and extent of this wonderful promise were immedi- 



137 



138 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



ately and fully understood. It was prophecy in embryo, 
the gospel in enigma. It was the millennial plant that 
required long centuries to bring it to blossom. And yet 
it must have afforded some intimation of future good, 
some indefinable support against despair. Perhaps the tri- 
umph of the woman's offspring, foreshadowed recovery 
from moral ruin, and visions of Paradise restored begat 
hope amid the desolation of Paradise lost. Certain it is, 
as we look back upon it from the vantage ground of six 
thousand years of history, and in the light of a resplendent 
and completed revelation, this strange promise, expressed 
in cypher, that ages of study would not suffice to translate, 
was the wrapped up hope of the world. If one looked for 
the first time at a rosebud, without previous knowledge or 
experience, while interest ~ and curiosity were excited, he 
might not be able to divine what that bud was destined 
to become. But, having seen it enlarge and develop 
and unfold into the fragrant flower, ever afterward he 
comprehends its meaning. In the swelling bud he recog- 
nizes the future rose. To our first parents there appeared 
in the wild morass of sin, in the edge of the ruined garden, 
a strange bud that somehow thrilled them with hope and 
wonder, though its mystic meaning was beyond their pene- 
tration. B^ut we, their posterity, in these remote ages, 
looking backward over the processes of history, can trace 
the evolution of that incipient flower, through all the stages 
of its development, as it enlarges in the patriarchical dis- 
pensation, gradually opens and unfolds through the centu- 
ries of prophetic announcement, until at last, as the full 
orbed Rose of Sharon, it fills all the earth with its fra- 
grance, and the ages with admiration. 

Analyzing the promise, in the light of subsequent reve- 
lation, as the botanist analyzes the bud, by the logic of 
fruit and flower, it unfolds to us the fundamental princi- 
ples of redemption. 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



139 



First. In the first place it is revealed that the Redeemer 
and Restorer of the race must be a man. It is the offspring 
of the woman that is to bruise the serpent's head, not an 
angel or archangel. God will vindicate the fallen human 
race by a divinely endowed human champion. All that 
was lost in the first Adam the second Adam shall restore. 
This is the first hint of the Divine Man that fills all the 
perspective of later revelation. A picture that grows more 
and more distinct as the Messianic idea develops. Begin- 
ning with the enigma of the promised seed, inspired men 
point with increasing light and knowledge to the Prophet 
to be raised up like unto Moses, to the Priest after the order 
of Melchizedek, to the virgin's son, whose name should be 
Immanuel, to the Angel of the Covenant and Lord of the 
Temple, till the Christ revealed in the gospel has become 
the heritage of mankind. 

And, when Jesus of Nazareth at last appears, and 
charms the world by the majesty and purity of his charac- 
ter, astonishes the world by the wisdom and power of his 
truth, and redeems the world by his sacrificial death, we 
say with all the force of a divine conviction, "This is he 
of whom Moses in the law and the prophets did write, 
Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph." Not only a man, 
but a man of humble origin and circumstances. The apos- 
tles also gloried in the humanity of Jesus Christ. That 
he who redeemed us was one of us. He who from eternity 
"was in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be 
equal with God, made himself of no reputation, and took 
upon him the form of a servant and was made in the like- 
ness of men." And, having assumed humanity, he shrank 
from no experience that belongs to humanity. He suffered 
and sorrowed as other men suffer and sorrow. Like all 
our unhappy race, he became obedient unto death. He was 
a man, truly and essentially, none the less truly, because a 
Djvine man. In him Compte's majestic dream of the apoth- 



140 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



eosis of humanity was realized, as witness the tribute paid 
to him through the ages, consciously and unconsciously, in 
memoirs, commentaries, creeds, theologies, periodicals, 
poems, paintings, structures, melodies, and, especially in the 
storms of hatred and persecution that rage unceasingly 
around his person, and we see in him the embodiment of 
all human excellence, the perfect, the ideal Man. 

But while the promise implies humanity, it implies more 
than humanity in the woman's illustrious offspring. The 
divinity and Godhead of the Messiah, to be revealed in 
future ages, are dimly yet distinctly foreshadowed. He is 
to "bruise the serpent's head," that old serpent called "the 
devil, that deceiveth the whole world." He is to make war, 
upon sin, and ultimately conquer and destroy the principle 
of evil. A superhuman and divine undertaking. A task 
before which angels and archangels stand helpless and ap- 
palled. Hence the man appointed to accomplish it must 
be a divine man, such a character as was realized in Jesus 
Christ "who was manifested that he might destroy the 
works of the devil." 

There is also in the promise an intimation of the vica- 
rious suffering or atonement by which a world is to be re- 
deemed. The seed of the woman does not come off un- 
harmed in his conflict with the serpent. He is to conquer, 
it is true ; an inspired apostle declares, "The Lord shall 
bruise Satan under our feet." But the fangs of the serpent 
shall strike him, and he shall bleed and suffer ere he con- 
quers. It is to be observed also that the promised redemp- 
tion, from the charm and venom of the serpent, involves a 
new nature for man, at enmity with the old and enslaved 
nature. And that this new nature is a divine creation, a 
renewal of the soul in righteousness. For observe it is 
not a natural enmity, but "I," the Lord, "will put enmity" 
between the redeemed man and the offspring of the devil 
so that they can never be reconciled, but shall always and 



i 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



141 



forever hate each other. Such a nature must be divine. 
God alone can plant in the heart of sinful man a hatred 
for sin, and raise up from a sinful race a holy people, who 
shall wage relentless war, a war of extermination, upon all 
that is sinful and unholy. The text is thus a prophecy, on 
the threshold of history, of an implacable conflict between 
humanity and the principle of evil, destined to be prolonged 
through far distant centuries and to fill the world with 
crime and carnage and tears, before the God of peace shall 
bruise Satan mortally under the feet of his saints. What a 
wonderful paragraph this is, worthy the veneration and 
study of the saints of all ages, and which even the angels 
with high and holy curiosity desire to look into. Only he 
who knew the end from the beginning could have given so 
few words such immortal meaning, could have packed into 
one portentous promise the. whole moral history of man- 
kind. 

I once purchased a little toy at Niagara Falls, as a 
souvenir of my visit, a delicate paper knife, on the hilt of 
which was a tiny glass set in imitation of pearl, that gave 
no intimation of being anything more than a mere orna- 
ment. On holding it close to one eye, however, and closing 
the other, a panorama of the great cataract burst upon the 
vision. On the other side, rise perpendicularly the granite 
walls of nature's everlasting masonry, which alone are 
strong enough to confine the mighty torrent that goes leap- 
ing and rushing through it. In front, the mighty cataract 
itself, a boiling ocean leaping from the clouds, and rising in 
variegated clouds of spray to the heights from which it 
sprang. Above, the broad, placid river, Goat Island, and the 
white sails of distant shipping in the harbor. All this to be 
seen by looking into that unpretentious little ornament. 

Here is a pearl picked up in the Garden of Eden, a sou- 
venir of man's original innocence and perfection. A mys- 
terious, enigmatical promise. It belonged to our first par- 



142 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



ents. It was the only treasure they carried with them into 
a sin blighted world, when Paradise was lost. It was 
somehow divinely preserved as the first and rarest gem 
of all prophecy, though its meaning was not even suspected 
through dark and hopeless centuries. This is not surpris- 
ing. For on the surface there is not perhaps a more mys- 
terious, baffling oracle in all the scriptures. A" strange, un- 
intelligible phraseology. But hold it up to the eye of faith 
and it becomes a telescope sweeping, the whole field of 
earth and time. The scroll of history is unrolled, the 
mighty drama of human events spread before the vision. 
Empires flourish and fall. Civilizations appear and, vanish. 
"The morning cometh and also the night." Oh the agony, 
the sorrow, the suffering, the shame in that dreadful pano- 
rama. Darker and more appalling grows the picture. 
Stronger and more defiant the cohorts of evil, weaker and 
more helpless the resistance of the righteous. "Truth is on 
the rack, Error on the throne." The darkest hour in earth's 
dark history has come. God has been banished from his 
own world, and the powers of darkness hold jubilee over 
the awful conquest, when a commotion appears in the 
earth a strange force is smiting the foundations of wick- 
edness. "A stone cut out of the mountains without hands" 
and projected by some invisible force is rolling through the 
ages, wrecking empires and overturning kingdoms, increas- 
ing in momentum and grandeur, till it becomes a mountain, 
and fills the whole earth with its glory. The long conflict 
is over. Order issues out of chaos, and human history ter- 
minates as it began, in righteousness and harmony with 
God. All this tumultuous history, all this wondrous re- 
demptive scheme is contained initially in this original and 
portentous promise. So that when we read in the opening 
chapter of the world's evangel, "The seed of the woman 
shall bruise the serpent's head" we may exclaim with an 
ancient writer: "Here begins the book of the wars of the 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



143 



Lord/' or with Luther, "Here rises the Son of Consola- 
tion.", As it would be impossible within reasonable limits 
to treat of this great promise as a whole, I wish to direct 
your attention to that portion of it that relates to the enmity 
that is to subsist forever between humanity and the off- 
spring of the serpent. Which is in fact a declaration of 
war at the beginning of history, to be waged through inter- 
minable centuries, until sin shall be destroyed and the 
Prince of Peace proclaim the millennium. This preference 
is logical. It is the natural order to give precedence to 
matters of the first importance. And this remarkable pre- 
diction is the very corps and essence of the promise. But 
my preference is more than logical. It is inviting and, to 
an earnest and reverent curiosity, irresistibly attractive, 
because it proposes a philosophy of the problem of evil. An 
explanation of the strife and turmoil and confusion and 
disorder, which beginning with the first murder, has red- 
dened the centuries with crime and made human history 
one long wail of anguish and despair. Why do men hate 
each other? What is it that arms nation against nation, 
and depopulates cities and wastes continents. Why must 
one generation build up, and another destroy? What in- 
fernal spirit gets control of men sometimes that they stone 
the prophets, burn the martyrs and crucify the Lord? 

What is that something in the human soul and in the 
human race that no amount of persecution or oppression 
can destroy? That survived the deluge, outlived the fabled 
dynasties of Egypt and Assyria, has migrated with the 
race to every clime, and has never left God without a 
witness among men. But has lifted a voice, and flamed an 
example against the sins of every age and people. That 
put a Lot in Sodom, an Elijah in Israel, a Daniel in Baby- 
lon, a Socrates in Athens, a Seneca in Rome, a Wyckliff, 
a John Huss, and a Luther in the darkness of medieval 
Europe. That gave France the Huguenots, Scotland the 



144 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



Covenanters, and New England the Pilgrim Fathers? 
What diabolical frenzy arrayed the men of the South 
against their brothers of the North a few years ago, and 
filled half a million bloody graves with its mangled victims 
before reason resumed its sway ? Why is Europe an armed 
encampment, the dogs of war straining at their leashes, 
martyr fires blazing in Armenia, China in the throes of 
dissolution, and a less bloody but equally determined con- 
flict raging betweeen labor and capital the world over. Will 
the long banished angel of peace ever return to this turbu- 
lent world? Will the time ever come when strife and tur- 
moil shall cease? When the clamor of excitement and of 
passions shall have died away out of men's ears and out 
of their hearts? Will the sublime vision of the poet ever 
become a reality? 

"When the war drums throb no longer, 
And the battle flags are furled 
In the parliament of man, 

The federation of the world." 

Yes, when Jehovah's incarnate Son, "the hero born of 
woman, has crushed the serpent with his heel," and the 
rebellion hatched in Eden, and propagated through the 
world, and down the ages, is destroyed in the person of 
the destroyer. Then shall the whole world, without one 
discordant note, take up the jubilant anthem, "Glory to 
God in the highest, on earth peace." For the Prince of 
Peace will- be on the throne. War will be a thing of the 
past cast into its native hell and shut up for all eternity. 
The mighty armies that hold the world in suspense with 
their dread preparations "shall beat their swords into plow 
shares, and their spears into pruning hooks." "Nation 
shall not lift up the sword against nation, neither shall they 
learn war any more." Political discord shall no more im- 
peril the state, nor theological dissension disturb the peace 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



145 



of the church. "Thy watchmen shall lift up the voice, with 
the voice together shall they sing, for they shall see eye to 
eye when the Lord shall bring again Zion." The social 
problem," the terror of rulers and the despair of political 
economists, shall find satisfactory solution. Capital will 
no more oppress labor, nor labor vex capital. Feuds and 
prejudices, old as the race and savage as the instincts of 
ferocious beasts, shall be eradicated, and hereditary enemies 
live together in peace. "The wolf shall dwell with the 
lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the 
calf, and the young lion, and the f atling together ; and a 
little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall 
feed. Their young ones shall lie down together, and the 
lion shall eat straw like the ox. And the sucking child 
shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child 
put his hand on the cockatrice den. They shall not hurt 
nor destroy in all his Holy Mountain, for the earth shall 
be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover 
the sea." 

To this sublime destiny our once lost, but now ran- 
somed and returning race shall attain when redemption is 
\ complete, and there appears a new heaven and a new earth, 
wherein dwelleth righteousness. 

It has long been a problem where the lost Eden was 
located. Volumes have been written and a vast amount of 
erudition displayed in the fruitless search. The three con- 
tinents of the Old World have been subjected to the most 
rigorous examination. From China to the Canary Islands, 
from the mountains of the Moon to the shores of the Baltic, 
no locality that corresponded in the slightest degree with 
the description of the first abode of the human race has 
been left unexplored, the consensus of opinion focalizing 
around some point in Central Asia. The most daring re- 
cent hypothesis, however, is that of President Warren, of 
Boston University, who, with great ingenuity, and a vast 



146 



THE FIRST 4 PR0MISE. 



amount of learning, undertakes to identify the North Pole 
with the site of original Eden. But all such speculations 
seem to me unprofitable and vain. It seems a pity to waste so 
much labor and learning on a subject of so little practical 
importance. But the thought that there is for the race, 
somewhere in the future, a condition of society as ideal 
as the home of Adam, and that mankind is marching, if 
slowly and painfully, yet surely in the direction of that 
happy estate, and that some time the lost Eden shall be 
restored, this vision of a golden age in the future, that has 
charmed the seers and inspired the poets through all earth's 
tragic history, is the inspiration of human progress. The 
improvement and perfection of society is the goal toward 
which the energies of the race are irresistibly impelled. 
And wars, conflicts, revolutions, the birth and burial of 
empires, the dawn and decay of civilizations, the alterna- 
tions of liberty and despotism, intelligence and ignorance, 
civilization and barbarism, tumults, riots, massacres and 
martyrdoms, are but phases of the perpetual conflict be- 
tween good and evil which began in Eden, when the Lord 
God put enmity between the serpent and the descendants of 
the first human pair. From the days of Cain and Abel 
there have been two classes in the world, the oppressor and 
the oppressed, the bloody tyrant, and the defenseless, the 
brave, the heroic, who suffer and die for the truth, and 
the base and brutal who seek to destroy whatever is pure 
and good. Two manner of people struggle together through 
the ages, a Cain and an Abel, an Ishmael and an Isaac, an 
Esau and a Jacob, an Absolom and a Solomon, the elder 
born after the flesh, the younger born after the spirit. And 
between these opposing parties, the church and the world, 
there has never been, can never be, truce or compromise. 
It is a war of extermination. The two principles cannot 
exist. One or the other must ultimately perish. Abraham 
Lincoln was not a prophet when he applied the words of 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



147 



Christ, "A house divided against itself cannot stand," to 
our unhappy and distracted country, essaying to reconcile 
freedom and slavery under the same flag. It was the intui- 
tion of reason and common sense that principles eternally 
at war must issue in the triumph of one or the other. And 
no sentence ever pronounced by uninspired lips exceeds in 
wisdom or political sagacity his deliberately expressed con- 
viction that the union could not permanently endure, half 
slave and half free. It must, in the course of time, become 
all one thing or all the other. Thank God, that prophecy 
has been fulfilled, and without hypocrisy we may glorify 
our country as "the land of the free and the home of the 
brave." What is true in America is true in the world. 
Good and evil, right and wrong, sin and holiness, cannot 
permanently exist in the same universe. One or the other 
must be destroyed. Either God will triumph or Satan, and 
this world become an annex of heaven or a suburb of hell. 
What a significance is given to the strife and turmoil of 
today, the collisions between right and wrong, in which 
we ourselves are concerned, are active participants, on one 
side or the other, to know it is but a continuation of the 
struggle which began when the devil invaded this world 
at Eden, and which is to go on until the millennium pro- 
claim the Prince of Peace. Whether we fight the evil in 
our own natures, or oppose wickedness in the world, we 
array ourselves with the holy and against the ungodly of 
all the ages. We fill, for the time, the place in the ranks 
once occupied by a Moses, a Joshua, a David, a St. Paul, 
a Polycarp, a Luther, a Wesley. We stand where the good, 
the true and the brave, of all history, have stood, for the 
defense of Right, and the overthrow of Wrong. Though 
the views be many, "the vision is one, and the interpreta- 
tion thereof sure." But two men have appeared in all 
earth's tragic history who were typical or representative. 
The first man, which is Adam, and the second man, which is 



148 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



Christ. And, under one or the other of these two great 
federal heads all humanity is marshaled. There is no 
middle ground, no neutral party. Every rational being is 
on one side or the other. Whatever he amounts to in in- 
fluence and character he is counted as the friend or foe of 
God Almighty. And men proclaim, by their attitude and 
behavior, where their sympathies are and to which army 
they belong. Every good act, every noble deed is a blow 
for God and the triumph of his cause. Every base act and 
ignoble deed an assassin's dagger at the heart of truth. 

It is a matter of astonishment sometimes, an insoluble 
enigma, that while some men and women labor heroically, 
even to the sacrifice of life, to build up virtue and morality, 
others move earth and hell to defeat their efforts and to 
sink their fellow men into deeper degradation. With a 
great price we have obtained our present civilization. It 
represents incomprehensible ages of suffering and sacrifice. 
Slowly through the centuries, amid blood and tears and 
anguish, we have builded the fabric of civilized society, 
toiling like the Jews who returned from Babylon and re- 
built the walls of Jerusalem with the sword in one hand 
and the trowel in the other. For every step of human prog- 
ress has been in the face of opposition. And even now in- 
the most enlightened nation and among the most refined 
and cultured people, we must stand guard night and day to 
protect our cherished institutions and preserve what we 
have won at so dear a cost. What precious thing in all 
this country is free from danger? Our public schools, the 
pride and safeguard of the Amreican people, have a power- 
ful and inveterate foe who would destroy them tomorrow 
if it were strong enough to attempt it. Atheism, in the 
concrete form of socialism and anarchy, is spreading like 
a contagion in the great cities and among the wage earners 
of the country. "Down with the churches and away with 
the Bible" is the cry of beer-soaked apostles of freedom. 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



149 



Others would annihilate the rights of property, and strike 
an equal division of the nation's wealth between the indolent 
and the industrious, the virtuous and the vagabond. And 
we have practically surrendered the holy Sabbath to the 
legions of enemies clamoring for its destruction, the corpo- 
rations, the beer gardens, the pleasure excursions, the sa- 
loons and the devil, while worldly amusements, impure lit- 
erature and unholy associations conspire to debauch and 
demoralize the youth of the land. Only by eternal vigi- 
lance can we prevent the foundations of society from be- 
ing undermined and stored with infernal dynamite. 

Whence the origin and what the cause of this unnatural 
and ceaseless struggle? Why is it that people who ought 
to be equally interested with ourselves in /building up the 
substantial interests of the community and of the world 
are madly endeavoring to tear down the civilization it has 
taken ages to produce? In the marvelous revelation of my 
text we have the answer, the philosophical explanation. 
The serpent that beguiled our first parents was to have a 
seed, that is, a party, animated by his spirit and bent on the 
accomplishment of his infernal purpose. The great deliv- 
erer also was to have followers who would be animated by 
his spirit and who would dare and suffer and die for the 
preservation of righteousness. It is the collisions of these 
two parties, on the battlefields of the world, that we witness 
in the struggle of history and in every moral issue that 
divides the people today. Beginning with Cain and Abel, 
the conflict between good and evil, right and wrong, God 
and Satan, has been perpetuated through the ages. And 
the whole history of the church and the world is but the 
portrayal of that conflict with its vicissitudes and varying 
fortunes. Sometimes righteousness victorious, as when the 
Roman emperor renounces paganism, and the standard of 
the cross is unfurled from the throne of the Caesars, or the 
Magna Charta of Anglo-Saxon liberty is wrested from a 



150 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



despotic king. At other times wickedness triumphant, as 
when Rome is red with the blood of the saints and the 
gardens of Nero illuminated with burning martyrs. 

Moral progress is never in a straight line, but like the 
zig-zag mountain path that sometimes turns backward upon 
itself, it forges steadily toward the summit. For the first 
three centuries of our era Christianity was invincible. 
"Fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an 
army with banners" the church moved forward conquering 
and to conquer, till the whole Roman world accepted its 
dominion. Then the pendulum gradually swung in the op- 
posite direction. And for 500 years the shadow was turned 
backward on the dial of progress. What a discouraging 
time that must have been for God's saints. The heroic 
and faithful few who kept their lights burning amid the 
gloom. "Through all the long dark night of years" the 
people's cry ascended. 

"The earth was wet with blood and tears ere their meek 
sufferings ended." But at last Wickliffe, the morning star 
of the reformation, arose in England, and then the funeral 
pile of John Huss glimmered a moment on the dark hori- 
zon of the continent and then a light burst forth from the 
cell of a monk that speedily irradiated the world. And, 
though there have been some disasters since, eddies in the 
stream of progress, yet the trend of human events toward 
a brighter and more glorious future has never been seri- 
ously obstructed. The American people are watching with 
the keenest interest the operations of our army and navy, 
in distant parts of the world, and as every day almost brings 
us tidings of new victories, our enthusiasm rises and our 
confidence in final victory amounts almost to a certainty. 

If Christian people were watching with the same in- 
tense interest the onward march of the sacramental hosts, 
they could shout every dav over triumphs of the cross 
more brilliant than Dewey's victory in Manila Bay, or 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



151 



Sampson's in Santiago Harbor. Europe is Christian, India 
is turning to God by the million. Japan must be the ful- 
fillment of the prophecy, "A nation born in day," for the 
whole empire has turned its back on paganism and its face 
toward the cross. Africa is being parceled out among the 
great enlightened powers, which means a united and gigan- 
tic effort of the whole world to lift it out of barbarism into 
the sunlight of a Christian civilization. 

And our recent war with Spain, so brilliant to the 
American arms, and which has left on our hands an un- 
solved problem in the far Orient, will nevertheless result 
in the extension to religious and civil liberty to ten million 
more oppressed and long enslaved human beings. Blind 
indeed must be the eye and perverse the intellect and heart 
that cannot see God in the march of human affairs, slowly 
yet surely evolving order out of moral chaos and re- 
enthroning righteousness in the earth.' "The blessed and 
only Potentate, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords," 
he leads the procession of the ages, the shock of armies and 
the ruin of empires only enhancing his glory. The scepter 
of his power is manifest more and more in all the spheres 
of human activity. "In the realm of intellect, neutralizing 
and destroying all false philosophy, and freeing, rousing, 
energizing the human mind. In material civilization, tun- 
neling mountains, cutting asunder continents, by canals, 
and uniting them again by lines of lightning beneath the 
seas, and links of fire above them. In religion, his churches, 
like innumerable candlesticks, bestudding Europe and 
America with radiant points of light, and spanning the 
moral heavens with a more glorious constellation than the 
milky way." Millions of Sabbath-school children celebrate 
his triumphal march with palm branches and hosannas. 
Missionary stations girdle the globe with centers of truth 
and moral illumination, dispelling the darkness that for 
ages has hung over continents, and opening the way for 



152 



THE FIRST PROMISE. 



commerce, to science, to justice, to liberty, to universal 
harmony and good will. What greater surprise for the 
world, what more astonishing thing in history than the 
responsibility God has suddenly thrust upon the people of 
the United States with regard to the world affairs. 

With our traditional and selfish policy of keeping out 
of the quarrels of Europe, rejoicing in our own liberty, and 
leaving the rest of the world to take care of itself, we 
woke up one morning in May, 1898, and found a group 
of barbarian islands on the opposite side of the globe, with 
eight million helpless and long abused people, lying at our 
door, as a respectable family sometimes finds an abandoned 
babe on the threshold. And without consulting us, whether 
it is pleasing to us or not, the responsibility of their care, 
their protection, their government and their civilization is 
upon us. Can we refuse, dare we shirk a responsibility 
so divinely imposed? 

It seems to me it requires but little faith to hear in the 
sound of Dewey's guns booming in Manila Bay the trumpet 
of the Lord announcing the resurrection of the long de- 
funct civilization in the East. While the drums of our 
soldiers in the Island of Luzon, beating the reveille of the 
millennial morning, proclaim : "The Lord God omnipotent 
reigneth. The nation or kingdom that will not serve him 
shall be destroyed." 



ALL IN CHRIST. 



BY REV. C. B. TAYLOR. 

Presiding Elder of the Bloomington District. 

"But of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto 
us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption." — 
I Cor. i .-30. 

"Thou, O Christ, art all I want, 
More than all in thee I find." 

This familiar strain is frequently quoted and sung. Is 
there full appreciation of the truth couched in the lines? 
Whatever the varied need of our complex nature, the scrip- 
tures present Christ as the full supply of that need. Mother, 
within the measure of her ability, anticipates and supplies 
the varied wants of her child. ''The soul, that on Jesus 
doth lean for repose," will find all of its needs supplied, 
"according to the riches of his grace in glory." As a mat- 
ter of clearness and convenience the wants of our natures 
may be expressed in different terms, such as "religion," 
"salvation," "conversion," etc. Paul in the text quoted 
offers a four-fold classification. Christ is made unto us 
wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemp- 
tion. 

Wisdom has a broad signification in the scriptures. It 
means to see. With the sensation of sight there is neces- 
sarily the phenomenon of light. It means light. Further, 
it implies the ability to discern between right and wrong 
and the power to choose the right. Christ is made unto 
us, light. "He is that light that lighteth every man." There 
are three ways in which he is made light to the believer. 

^53 



154 



ALL IN CHRIST. 



He illuminates life's environment. Did one desire to ex- 
plore the Mammoth Cave he would require a light and 
guide to do it comfortably, safely and successfully. There 
are pit-falls, subterranean streams, winding recesses, far 
reaching passages, darkness and solitude that without 
necessary precaution and help render the act dangerous in 
the extreme. The darkness is so opaque, it would seem 
that when the fiat "let there be light" was uttered the night 
of chaos had rolled back into this great cavern and con- 
gealed. Darkness so thick one can almost feel it; solitude 
so intense one can hear his own blood flow through 
its accustomed channels, or beat against the cells of his 
brain. Left alone without light or guide means death by 
fright, insanity, starvation or accident. With a light and 
guide, however, this wonderful physical phenomenon be- 
comes a thing of grandeur, entertainment and instruction. 
One has increasing enjoyment as he views its magnificent 
chambers, its domes of crystal beauty, its pillars of stalac- 
tite and stalagmite, its winding and far-reaching corridors, 
or floats securely upon the waters of its subterranean river, 
or feasts upon music which, as the sound waves of the 
singers' voices scatter in the dark recesses, gather into a 
diapason and return in a shower of melody, seem like frag- 
ments from celestial choirs. The cave is not changed by the 
introduction of the light and guide, but the way is lighted 
up so that one can, who chooses so to do, avoid that which 
is dangerous and utilize that which is -profitable. Life is 
surrounded by perils, pit-falls, darkness, death. We need 
a light and guide, "when life's dark maze we tread and 
griefs around us spread." Christ by the text is made 
unto us wisdom. He illuminates the way. He is the way. 
Who receives him into his life will be enabled to discern be- 
tween the good and evil and always to choose the good. 
Christ will fill his life with the best; will crown his years 
with goodness and flood the soul with the music of 
heaven. 



ALL IN CHRIST. 



155 



Being made unto us wisdom, Christ also illuminates the 
inner life. Abnormal growths and foreign substances 
sometimes destroy the physical health and threaten the life. 
Often they are invisible to the natural eye. Through the 
medium of the X-Ray these abnormal growths and physical 
impediments can be located, when the hand of the skillful 
surgeon may remove them, thus restoring health and pro- 
longing life. Christ illuminates the inner life of the be- 
liever. Abnormal dispositions ; habits, the result of in- 
herent tendencies or of external temptation, which destroy 
spiritual health and threaten spiritual life, all may be lo- 
cated and, with the assistance of the Divine Physician, may 
be expelled from the soul, restoring spiritual "health and 
quickening spiritual life. 

Christ illuminates the life by causing the unseen to be 
seen and by drawing the remote near. We are surrounded 
by an unseen physical world, as real and greater than the 
world we see with unaided vision. Light focused 
through the microscope brings a part of this great and in- 
visible world to view. A drop of water is a sphere teem- 
ing with life. The number of celestial bodies visible to the 
naked eye is small compared with the multiplied blazing 
suns, circling worlds and scintillating stars revealed 
through the telescope. The moon, 240,000 miles distant, 
is brought so near by this instrument that we can see its- 
mountain ranges, note the shadows which they cast upon 
Jfts surface, view its /"showery sea" and its magnificent 
canyon systems. That point of light visible in the southern 
sky during the past summer is Jupiter. Regarded with the 
unaided eye it appears no larger than a silver dime. Its 
diameter, however, is eleven times greater than the earth's. 
Four hundred millions of miles distant, to the natural eye 
it is but a point of light. Observed through the telescope 
it becomes a planet with four moons, and a belt clearly 
visible around its center. The invisible becomes visible. 



156 



ALL IN CHRIST. 



That smaller point of light is Saturn. It is nine hundred 
millions of miles distant. So remote that should one tra- 
verse the distance, traveling at the rate of sixty miles per 
hour, without stop, it would require 1,712 years and four 
months to make the trip. Through the medium of the tele- 
scope Saturn is brought near and her rings and eight 
moons, invisible to the unaided eye, become visible. Christ 
in. the believer's life, broadens its horizon, extends its ze- 
nith and expands its firmament, causes the unseen to be 
seen and brings the remote near. The unreal to the natural 
man becomes the most real to the spiritual. Thus does 
Christ give us a glimpse of the celestial city. We can see 
its streets of gold, its walls of jasper and its gates of pearl. 

"We see the triumph from afar, 
By faith we bring it nigh." 

Christ is made unto us righteousness. "And be found 
in him, not having my own righteousness, which is of the 
law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the 
righteousness whic(i is of God by faith." The righteous- 
ness that counts is of faith. In order to right living man 
needs to be made right. Rightness is essential to right do- 
ing. Without the rightness which is of faith, the doing 
will be irksome and slavish. With Christ the "yoke is easy 
'and the burden light." Sin has an effect upon the soul 
similar to the effect of disease upon the body. - Disease 
dwarfs, deforms, circumscribes the body. Sin deforms,* 
dwarfs, limits the powers of the soul. The dwarfed and 
deformed cannot measure up to the perfect standard of 
physical manhood, unless some remedy be discovered that 
will take the crook out of the body. No more can man 
measure up to the moral standard that counts, unless some 
remedy be applied to remove the moral deformity. Sin 
has for its root meaning to "miss the mark." Sin won't 



AUv IN CHRIST. 157 

I 

work outright. It means inequality, short measure, light 
weight. Abraham believed God and it was imputed unto 
him for righteousness. The object of that faith was Christ, 
the promised Christ. Christ was made unto him righteous- 
ness in the sense that righteousness is imputed because of 
faith, and he obeyed God perfectly. Who receives Christ 
into his life by an appropriating faith has Christ's righteous- 
ness imputed to him. Christ equalizes the inequalities, takes 
the crook out of his nature, gives right impulse and direc- 
tion to the life, clothes him about with his righteousness and 
enables him to love God and keep his commandments. 

It is not enough that the house be rid up and illumi- 
nated, it needs keeping in cleanly and sanitary condition. 
Cleanliness is next to Godliness. It will not suffice to erect 
a new residence, furnish it elegantly, close it tightly and 
expect it to remain clean and wholesome. It requires 
not only the annual renovating, but the daily cleansing, the 
daily letting in of fresh air and sunshine, the daily ridding 
of all its appointments, which in the routine of life may 
become contaminated or disordered. To rid the house and 
close it tightly against air, light and sun-warmth is to 
invite unhealth and uncleanliness. Isolation is not the 
method of the divine life. The man who entered the mon- 
astery that he might withdraw from the world and its 
tempter and thus be religious and holy, learned that even 
in that isolation the tempter was present. For when in the 
act of returning to his cell from the fountain with a pitcher 
of water, he caught his foot on an obstruction, fell, broke 
the pitcher and the third commandment at the same time. 
The divine method is to live in the world, do deeds of mercy 
and help and keep clean from the world. How may we 
effect this? Christ is made unto us sanctification, or purifi- 
cation. Not once merely, in conversation, not twice merely 
in the "second blessing," but every day. "I need thee 
every hour, most gracious Lord." 

Under the old dispensation there were daily, annual 



158 ALL IN CHRIST. 

I 

and other sacrifices, among them that of the red heifer. 
This last mentioned was for the purification of the people 
from their contamination incident to their wilderness jour- 
ney; all were prototypal of Christ. He is the believer's 
daily provision for keeping himself "unspotted from the 
.world." To whom Christ is made purification, he is clean 
indeed. 

■ The ultimate of Christ's work in our lives is not pri- 
marily to save us from everlasting pain, or to save us to 
eternal bliss, or to quiet the conscience here and now. All 
these are concomitants of his work. They accompany the 
scheme, but are not the supreme object of the scheme. The 
supreme object of the gospel is the perfection of Christian 
character. Christ is therefore made unto us redemption. 
We need rounding up. "Whom he did foreknow, them he 
did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son." 
Christ is made unto us redemption. Redeemed means to 
be bought back with a price. Back to what ? To the image 
lost in the original disobedience. To the enjoyment of holi- 
ness. To the possession of the characteristics of the sons 
of God. "Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and 
precious promises ; that by these ye might be partakers of 
the divine nature." Hell and heaven, remorse or an ap- 
proving conscience are consequences of a choice. The es- 
sential is the reception or rejection of Christ. The supreme 
purpose of accepting him is that we may become like him. 
Bishop Brooks said that "Christian character is the greatest 
power in the universe." It is a belittling conception of the 
gospel that regards the work of Christ merely as a fire 
escape, an expedient for "fleeing the wrath to come," or 
. hoicks that by some mysterious process it is intended to pull 
us into heaven bye and bye, or introduce us into an extatic 
frame of mind now. These may be some of the effects, 
they are not the thing itself. Have we not been more 
concerned with the effects than with the cause? Do we 



AUv IN CHRIST. 



159 



not more highly esteem the fruits than the tree? Have 
we not been more interested in the blessings that Christ 
brings than in the Christ ? We are saved from sin that we 
may be conformed to his image. "Jesus men" and "Jesus 
women/' terms used by the heathen to designate our mis- 
sionaries, accurately place the purpose of redemption be- 
fore us. Our lives are to reproduce the Christ life. Will 
they not do this if Christ be made unto us all that is implied 
in the text? Will we not, like Paul, exclaim: "I am 
crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, Christ 
liveth in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh, I 
live by the faith of the Son of God; who loved me and 
gave himself for me." In another place Paul says : "I 
therefore the prisoner in the Lord." The very element in 
which he lived, the very atmosphere he breathed was Christ. 
Is it any wonder that his character is so glorious? What 
is the process of our redemption or rounding up? Christ 
for us, we for Christ. "'I beseech ye, therefore, brethren, 
by the mercies of God that ye present your bodies a living 
sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reason- 
able service. And be not conformed to this world; but be 
ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may 
prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will 
of God." Having respect unto the recompense of reward 
is scriptural. Heaven beyond is a glorious, inspiring vision, 
but if Christ is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, 
and sanctification, and redemption all of the benefits of his 
passion and death become real to us now. One of the wit- 
nesses of the spirit, assuring us of sonship, is the fruit of 
the spirit in a redeemed, well-rounded Christian character. 
This is the noblest work of God ! This is the finest prod- 
uct of infinite skill ! Such a character can never die. The 
moment the body sinks to the earth a lifeless clod but 
ushers in its true existence, and in perennial youth it will 
live forever a blessing to itself, a benediction to the race. 
Thus if Christ be made unto us wisdom, the ability to 



160 



ALL IN CHRIST. 



discern and choose the right ; righteousness, correcting our 
moral deformities ; sanctification, our purification from 
daily contamination of the world ; redemption, the rounding 
out and reproduction of the Christ life in Christian charac- 
ter, "Heaven will come down our souls to greet, while 
glory crowns the mercy-seat." 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 



BY REV. CHRIS GALEENER. 

Pastor of Kimber Church, Danville. 

"God who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in times 
past to the fathers by the prophets." — Hebrews I :i. 

"All scripture is given by inspiration of God." — II Tim. iii:i6. 
"But holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy 
Ghost." — II Peter, i :2i. 

These and many other passages might be cited as proof 
texts for the doctrine of the divine inspiration of the Bible. 
There is certainly no doctrine held by evangelical Chris- 
tians that has passed under a more searching scrutiny in 
the last few years than this concerning the inspiration of 
the Bible. Never did the discussion of religious matters 
occasion more disquiet in the minds of thinking Christians 
than this. Many a devout Christian has been asking: 
"What are the critics going to do with my Bible? Will 
there be anything left of it when they get through with it ?" 

The orthodox Christian has timidly watched the scaf- 
folding which the imaginations of succeeding generations 
have erected about the old Bible tumbling into ruin and 
often feared that it was the Word itself that was being 
wrecked. But no, my friends, there is nothing to fear. 
Let the superstitions topple into ruin ; they have only ob- 
scured the sublime beauty of the Word of God which stand- 
eth sure. About the security of the Word itself we need 
have no fear. Indeed, I think that in the last few years 
there has been quite a reaction in favor of a corrected view 
of inspiration. 

161 



162 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 



What are we to understand by the declaration that the 
Bible is inspired? A tyro in theology knows that there are 
several distinct theories of inspiration. I am not going to 
take your time to even outline them with the exception of 
two, which are about as far apart as the poles, and then in- 
troduce a third, which stands somewhere between these 
extremes and appears to me to satisfy all the demands of 
reason and revelation. 

The first of these is what might be termed the Natural 
Theory. It is so easy and simple that it has gained ground 
quite rapidly among those who are a little disposed to rule 
out all that is supernatural in revelation. The fact that it 
contains a small amount of truth makes it all the more dan- 
gerous. This theory is that the Bible is a collection of doc- 
uments, written in good faith by intelligent and trust- 
worthy men, whose work was superintended and guided by 
the Holy Ghost. But this inspiration was no higher than 
that accorded to the work of every noble writer. It con- 
siders that every poet of high order was inspired. David 
and Isaiah stand on the same level as Milton and Shakes- 
peare. Bunyan was as much the amanuensis of God as 
Daniel. 

There is no doubt a measure of truth in this theory. I 
think it would be a great mistake to think that inspired men 
existed only in the past and there were no inspired writings 
except those bound up in the Bible. I have no doubt that God 
has moved upon ',he hearts of men in every age and genera- 
tion and inspired them with lofty thoughts for the benefit of 
the race. I am not disposed to deny that such men as Luther 
and Wesley were inspired to undertake the work which 
they individually accomplished. I feel quite certain that 
Bunyan was especially endowed from on high with wisdom 
to write his great allegory. But all this is not inconsistent 
with the idea that God specially trained one nation for the 
sake of the rest and then selected certain ones from the 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 



163 



mass to whom he gave a special commission and sent them 
out with a message especially inspired. This I claim is inspi- 
ration of a higher order, because the truths which they were 
to proclaim were to become the basis of all subsequent re- 
ligious teaching. Their writings were to be fundamental. 
Much that they had to say was concerning truths that man 
could not discover without a divine revelation. 

Let us pause here long enough to learn what some of 
these ancient authors thought of their own inspiration. 

King David says : 

"The Spirit of the Lord spake by me, and His word was in my 
tongue'.' — 2 Sam. xxiii :2. 

Isaiah declares : 

"For the Lord spake thus to me with a strong hand, and in- 
structed me." — Isa. viii :ii. 

Jeremiah, speaking more at length regarding his mission, 
says : 

"Now the word of the Lord came unto me, saying: Before I 
formed thee in the belly I knew thee ; and before thou earnest forth 
out of the womb I sanctified thee. I have appointed thee a prophet 
unto the nations. Then said I, Ah, Lord God, behold, I cannot 
speak ; for I am a child. But the Lord said unto me : Say not, I am 
a child; for to whomsoever I send thee thou shalt go, and whatso- 
ever I command thee thou shalt speak. . . . 

'Behold, I have put my words into thy mouth. See, I have this 
day set thee over the nations," etc. — Jer. i :5-io. 

Ezekiel tells us how he was called to become the messen- 
ger of God: 

"The Spirit lifted me up and took me away, and I went in bitter- 
ness in the heat of my spirit, and the hand of the Lord was heavy 
upon me." — Ezek. iii- :i4. 

A large number of examples might be cited were it nec- 
essary but it is not. These suffice to show us how these 
"holy men of old" regarded their own inspiration. "They 



164 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 



spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost" and not of 
themselves. Often they went reluctantly, groaning under 
the heavy hand of God. They felt that the woes of Jehovah 
would rest upon them if they did not obey. Theirs was no 
natural poetic frenzy. It was of God. So, at any rate, 
they believed. 

If we turn to the New Testament we find many of its 
authors making for their messages the same claims. St. 
Paul, speaking of his gospel, says : "For neither did I re- 
ceive it from man, nor was I taught it, but it came to me 
through revelation of Jesus Christ." 

Notice also how this same writer begins all his epistles : 
"Paul, an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ." 

Sometimes like the prophets of old, he says : "This we 
say unto you by the .word of the Lord." 

We can readily see what Paul thought of the Old Testa- 
ment writings by a perusal of his own. He often speaks of 
them as "The oracles of God." He tells us what "God said 
in Hosea," or what "God said in another place," etc. Thus 
- the New Testament is made to bear witness to the inspiration 
of the Old, and both make claims to being of supernatural 
origin. 

I think there can be no doubt to a reasonable mind after 
a careful perusal of the scriptures that the authors them- 
selves believed that they had a kind of special inspiration, a 
miraculous endowment from God. 

The theory of natural inspiration does not satisfactorily 
account for many things that we find in the Bible. Many of 
the great fundamentals of our religion, as immortality, a 
coming Messiah, and salvation through the atoning blood 
of the Redeemer could have been apprehended only through 
a supernatural revelation. The lofty moral ideals of the 
Old Testament could not have been attained in the barbarous 
ages in which it was written save through a special miracu- 
lous inspiration. 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 165 

Over against this natural theory and occupying the oppo- 
site extreme stands a severe theory of Verbal Inspiration. 
This theory claims that the Bible is inspired verbatum et 
punctuatum. That every word, letter and punctuation 
mark was inspired of God. This theory claims that the 
writers of the Bible were no more than machines, as the 
typewriter serves the purpose of the author of today, so 
these holy men were mere instruments for recording the 
thought of the Divine Being. 

This theory was held by the rabbins in the days of 
Christ. These teachers went so far as to count and keep a 
careful record of the letters and characters employed in 
writing the scriptures, and if a copy, newly written, varied 
in the least it was condemned. , 

Such a theory leaves no place for any human element 
in the writing of the word of God. He might just as well 
have given us his word in the same manner as that claimed 
for the Book of Mormon. We are told that the prophet 
Joseph Smith was led by divine inspiration to the place 
where "The Golden Plates" were concealed, and having dug 
them out of the hill he found a wonderful book, written 
in an unknown tongue, which he was enabled to translate 
by divine guidance. Thus the Book of Mormon is triply 
inspired. 

No one doubts that God could have so given us his word. 
B'ut I think few with any degree of intelligence believe that 
he did so give it. 

There are a great many considerations which lead the 
thoughtful man to the conclusion that God did not care to 
dictate the very words in which the truth which he desired 
to communicate was to be couched. Had he done so we 
certainly would find in revelation a faultless grammar, as 
well as infallible statements. We should expect a lofty 
style that was absolutely beyond criticism and a diction that 
could in no wise be amended. But such is not the case in 



166 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 



every part. There is so much that bears the stamp of the 
human in the scriptures that we are constrained to admit 
that God permitted the human element to have its way so 
long as it did not mar the accuracy of the divine thought or 
vary from the truth. 

This leads me to remark that I think the real truth lies 
somewhere between these two extremes. I believe that 
God inspired holy men with a plenitude of wisdom that 
enabled them to state what he wanted stated and to tell in 
their own words and according to their own styles the 
mighty truths which he wanted the world to know. The 
Divine Being came so near to them in some unknown way 
that he filled their minds with his own thought. They 
became saturated with it, just as a student becomes saturated 
with the truth taught him by his master and is then able 
to go out and tell the world what his master taught, 
but couches it in his own language. These authors never 
lost their individuality. If one possessed poetic genius he 
was enabled to set the truths of God to poetic measure and 
with true poetic fancy garnish the thoughts with which he 
was inspired. Thus we have some of the divine messages 
throbbing in the measures of sublimest song. If the writer 
had an inclination toward law, then to him was intrusted 
the responsibility of expressing the divine ideas of law and 
jurisprudence. In others burned the true prophetic fire, 
and their eyes were opened to see the wonders of coming 
ages, and they write with charming grace of the majestic 
march of the coming King. Some were natural preachers 
of righteousness, and the burden of their messages was the 
woe of sin and the wrath of God against iniquity. 

It is the employment of these human elements that has 
given to the Bible its great variety and versatility. It 
becomes at once a magnificent collection of literature, phi- 
losophy, law, political economy, hygiene and religion. It 
is a veritable encyclopedia in small space, and all because 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 167 

God employed experts in all lines and then supernaturally 
endowed them with wisdom that is above this world. 

It was in this way that the Bible became for us a mir- 
ror of our own emotions and aspirations and passions. 
When we come to the Bible we seem there to find often 
the best expression of our feelings. Are you cast down 
with fear? Turn to some of the Psalms of David, written 
in the time of his trouble, and he seems to give voice to 
the deep emotions of your own soul. Does sin threaten 
your peace? The same author seemed inspired to express 
your supplications better than you could do it yourself. 
Does your soul rise on the jubilant wings of victory? 
Again this same man of varied experience seems better 
qualified to sing your exultant song than you yourself can 
be. Why? Because this man had run the whole gamut 
of human experience. He possessed the poetic instinct, 
and above all his soul was filled with the spirit of inspira- 
tion, and he became thus divinely qualified to sing for us 
our songs of penitence and give expression to our exuber- 
ant joy. We can readily see the advantages of the intensely 
human element under the control of the divine. 

The human element in inspiration makes sure of its com- 
prehensibility by the people to whom it is addressed. A 
revelation without any admixture of the human would be 
in danger of becoming like many sermons, "over the head 
of the audience." The revelation might be very complete 
and perfect, but nevertheless incomprehensible. When God 
compressed his wisdom within the range of the human 
mind and expressed it in the vocabulary of the human race 
he made sure that it could be understood by the very ones 
who needed it most. 

In the incarnation of Christ we have a wonderful par- 
allel. "The word became flesh and dwelt among us." In 
him we find weakness and power uniting. In him we find 
wisdom ineffable alongside of a humility which declares 



168 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 



that there were some things unknown. Subject to heavi- 
ness and weariness, yet tireless in all efforts to bless man- 
kind. In him shone all the glory of the divine Godhead, 
though veiled in a human frame. He was a perfect union 
of the human and the divine. In this the written word per- 
fectly symbolizes him. It, too, is the expression of the 
divine wisdom, power and glory. It, too, is in the world 
in might and power. It, too, exhibits a majesty, a purity 
and an exalted moral character which plainly proves its 
origin is heavenly and not of the earth. 

This commingling of the divine with the human is so 
intricate and so blended that we cannot say where the one 
ends and the other begins. Just as in the life of Jesus it 
would be impossible to so classify his acts as to say of one, 
"This is divine and this is human." Some of his words 
were so ordinary as to need nothing but plain common- 
sense for their dictation, while others expressed such exalted 
wisdom as to prove divine illumination. So the sacred 
scriptures cannot be separated into classes to be denominated 
human and divine. It will never do to select out certain 
passages and say, "This is so plainly human that nothing 
divine or supernatural attaches to it, and it may be cast out 
without hurt to the record." 

In our consideration of all theories of inspiration we 
ought to make a distinction between revelation and inspira- 
tion. We too often confound them. They are not synony- 
mous. 

A revelation is the disclosure of a fact not otherwise 
known. There were certain great and fundamental facts 
about God and man and redemption and immortality that 
man could learn only from the lips of God himself. No 
process of reasoning could bring them to light. Man had 
no means of discovering these truths. Hence they were 
given to him by a direct revelation from God. 

On the other hand there were many facts of human 
history and experience that men knew without any special 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 



169 



revelation. Many of these facts and experiences were 
recorded in written history. They were written by historians 
of undoubted veracity and were well attested. Such facts 
could be inserted into the body of scripture by inspired men 
without any direct revelation. The authors were inspired 
to write that which was already known to them without 
miraculous intervention. There was no need that the author 
of the Book of Kings, for example, should have made to 
him a miraculous revelation of Jewish history to enable him 
to write what he did. The same may be said of all the 
historical books of the Bible. 

But let no one fall into the mistake of imagining that 
these historical parts of the Bible were any the less inspired. 
The Holy Spirit could and did undoubtedly exert a con- 
trolling influence, directing what to use and what to discard, 
and thus th* record was preserved from all those absurd 
myths and legends which so disfigure and encumber the 
writings of other ancient authors. 

If any one will take the trouble to compare the apocry- 
phal gospels with those of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John 
he will discover the immense advantage of the true over the 
false. In the accounts of our Lord's life as given by inspira- 
tion there is a lofty dignity, mingled with a charming sim- 
plicity, that is in strange contrast with the puerile stories 
jumbled together in the apocryphal narratives. 

We find no difficulty at all in admitting that the biogra- 
phy and history of the Bible may have been derived from 
sources accessible to all who cared to write on these sub- 
jects; but at the same time we cannot help noticing such a 
superiority in the character of the inspired writings over 
those produced by the unaided human mind that we must 
also admit that a superior mind guided in the selection and 
arrangement of the matter composing the books of the 
Bible. 

No harm can possibly be done to the cause of trutn by 
admitting that many books of the Bible bear the stamp of 



170 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 



joint authorship. Some of them appear to be compilations 
gathered from many sources and most carefully edited. I 
cannot see where any harm can come from admitting that 
if an inspired author should find a passage in the works of 
some contemporaneous writer that exactly expressed his 
idea, that he should have incorporated it into his own pro- 
duction. We know that Paul did do this very thing on more 
than one occasion. Our theory of inspiration contends for 
the constant superintendence of the Holy Spirit in selec- 
tion, arrangement and classification of divine truth. The 
facts might be gathered from any source. Truth is truth, 
from whencesoever it may come, and the Holy Ghost was 
careful only that the truth should be recorded. 

Essential truths that could be apprehended by man only 
through a supernatural revelation were presented to him 
in that way. But those truths that could come to him 
through a natural channel were so given him, and men 
were inspired as much to write the one class as the other. 

Thus we contend that the Bible is a record of truth. I 
care not whence the truth was derived, or how it came into 
the human mind, the essential thing is the fact that the 
truth is recorded, and I believe this was done by men inspired 
of the Holy Ghost. "Holy men of God spake as they were 
moved by the Holy Ghost." 

The psychology of inspiration is one of the most inter- 
esting of studies in this connection, but would require far 
more space for its full discussion than the limits of this 
sermon will allow. The new psychology is throwing con- 
siderable light upon this matter. 

The most recent research in the department of meta- 
physics is bringing to light some curious laws of mind not 
heretofore recognized. Our older psychology dealt mostly 
with the phenomena of the separate individual mind. The 
phenomena of the soul were studied with reference to itself 
alone. But little attention was paid to the influence of mind 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 



171 



upon mind. Within the last twenty years scientific men 
have been studying the influence of mind upon mind with 
the same care and precision of experiment as they have 
been bestowing upon the physical sciences, with the result 
that they have made many and valuable discoveries. They 
have found out that spiritual beings influence each other 
as profoundly as the planets do each other in their orbits. 

We have discovered that some minds are far more easily 
influenced than others and that some possess this mys- 
terious soul power to a far greater extent than others. The 
"magnetic speaker" wields a wonderful power over his 
auditors. Why? None can tell unless it be that his soul 
binds with a curious spell those who listen. The theory 
of thought transference without the medium of sight or 
sound is proven beyond all controversy, thus establishing 
the fact that one mind may convey its contents to another 
without written or spoken sign. 

If all this be true with reference to human minds why 
may it not be true on a far larger scale with reference to 
the Divine mind ? There is no law of the soul which he 
does not understand : no process that is mysterious to him. 
If in a small way one human mind can so influence another 
that it can cause the subject to speak the very thought of 
the controlling spirit, why may not God so control a human 
soul that he may be impelled to speak and write the thought 
of the Divine? 

Hypnotic experiment has demonstrated that a subject fre- 
quently placed under the influence of a stronger will becomes 
entirely passive, so that while in such state, he appears to 
have no thought of his own. He thinks and acts according 
to the mind and will of his master. In some such way these 
"holy men of God" were doubtless moved by the Holy Ghost. 
Men who live much in the, presence of the Divine, seem to 
become en rapport with the Divine mind and read the Divine 
thought and imbibe the Divine spirit. This enabled them to 



172 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 



write and speak as the oracles of God. There was no oblit- 
eration of their personal peculiarities. They thus main- 
tained their individuality, while they became the channel 
through which poured the streams of Divine wisdom. They 
did not always understand their own messages and often 
cogitated upon them like Daniel, until they became sick, but 
this fact only attests the supernatural character of their 
works. 

Modern skepticism urges certain complaints against the 
inspiration of the Bible on the ground of scientific inaccura- 
cies and moral inconsistencies. 

Concerning these I have but little to say, as I think they 
can be disposed of by the candid mind in very short order. 
The Bible makes no claims to being a textbook in science, 
and therefore its scientific allusions are not couched in 
technical language. If it were so it would defeat its own 
purpose. It is written in the language of the common peo- 
ple and for the common people. But that its allusions to 
scientific facts and principles are false or faulty has never 
been proven. Before we discount the Bible on account of 
supposed scientific errors we must be sure of two things — 
first, that we have correct theories of science; and, second, 
that we are certain that our interpretation of the Bible is 
the correct one. We may be at fault in both these respects. 
Our scientific theories are constantly changing. Hundreds 
of theories have been held and then discarded by the scientific 
world within fifty years. The theories of today may be 
laughed to scorn tomorrow. So it will not do to say that the 
Bible bears the marks of fallibility because it will not 
exactly register with the deductions of constantly changing 
science. . 

Then theologians have been compelled to change some 
of their views of interpretation. We have discarded some 
of the things which our fathers thought the Bible taught. 
For example, a hundred years ago the theologians all 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 173 

believed that the Bible taught that the whole creation was 
begun and finished in six literal days. No intelligent man 
now thinks that it teaches any such thing. The theological 
world in the days of Gallileo taught that the world was flat 
and stationary and the stars moved about it and grounded 
the doctrine on the word of God. No intelligent reader 
of the word finds in it any such doctrine today. When the 
world is well enough educated to interpret the true scientific 
teaching of Nature and understand the doctrines of the 
Bible I believe that they will be found to be in most per- 
fect accord. 

But I am inclined to think that what are termed the 
moral inconsistencies of the Bible are the ground of more 
trouble to the devout student of the Word than the so-called 
scientific inaccuracies. 

We find in the Old Testament some things that shock 
our moral sensibilities, and as we recoil from them we are 
inclined to question, "Can this be the inspired truth?" 
Time would fail me here to fully treat these difficulties as 
they deserve, but I think I can offer you a solution. 

We observe that all these moral difficulties appear in the 
older portions of the scriptures, away back yonder in the 
very morning of the human race. A careful scrutiny of 
the Bible reveals a gradually ascending moral ideal. God 
was compelled to deal with the race as a parent deals with 
his family. He could not all at once inculcate the loftiest 
moral principles. He must begin their moral culture at a 
low point, because he found them there. Every observant 
parent has noticed that the moral conception of the child 
is very far below that of a well disciplined adult. A child 
has a very vague idea of the rights of his playmates; he 
does not scruple at pain inflicted upon those who oppose 
his will. So revelation came to the race in its infancy and 
must necessarily be adapted to his moral apprehension. But 
any one may easily see the gradually improving moral 



174 HOW GOD INSPIRED THE BIBLE. 

quality of the scripture until it teaches an ethical code that 
is the wonder of the world. 

We ought also to learn to discriminate between the 
inspiration of the record and the inspiration of the thing 
recorded. There is language recorded in the Bible by 
inspiration that was not originally inspired. For example, 
in the book of Job we find the language of Satan recorded 
by inspiration, but no one believes that Satan was inspired 
to utter it. In the same book we find the language of Job's 
three friends recorded by inspiration, although much of 
what they said was sheer nonsense and not at all uttered 
by inspiration. When we learn to make these distinctions 
we shall avoid many of the supposed moral difficulties of 
the Bible. 

There is no reason for the assumption that God gave 
to man a perfect revelation in the beginning. He revealed 
as much as would be useful to the race. He delivered it 
in the best manner for the age in which it was given. He 
tempered his truths to the understanding of the people at 
the time and contented himself as any wise teacher will 
with adapting his teaching to immediate requirements. 

Thus his revelation has a progressiveness that commands 
the admiration of all candid students. God did for the race 
just what the secular teacher does for his pupils : He gave 
them a text just suited to their wants. When the child 
in the elementary school takes in his hand for the first time 
the textbook which is to become the open door to mathe- 
matics he is not given a complete Euclid. There he finds 
first principles, and perhaps these are not always couched 
in severely scientific language. He approaches the temple 
of knowledge by a roundabout way, but he moves grad- 
ually forward. When one book is finished he lays it aside 
for one a little more advanced, until he has climbed the 
heights of wisdom, from which, looking backward, he sees 
a beautiful harmony in the entire course. So God has dealt 



HOW GOD INSPIRED THE] BIBLE. 175 

with the race as with one colossal man. His infancy began 
in the centuries now veiled in antiquity, his youth was con- 
temporaneous with the patriarchs, and he blossomed into 
young manhood when the word was fashioned in the form 
of man. Through all these cycles the kindly eye of the 
Heavenly Teacher has been over him with unsleeping vigil- 
ance. His sacred truth has come to him in installments 
exactly suited to his attainments in wisdom, and has all 
along the ages grown brighter and brighter unto the perfect 
day. Perhaps when we shall have graduated from the 
school of time our race will behold a still sublimer glory in 
the Word in a land where time shall be no more. 



A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 



BY J. F. WOLFARTH, D.D. 

Pastor of Grace Church, Decatur, III. 
"What manner of child shall this be?" — Luke, i :i6. 

The question of our text was asked because of the 
remarkable things which had happened previous to the birth 
of the son of Zacharias. Zacharias had doubted the word 
of the Lord concerning the birth of his child, and in conse- 
quence had been deaf and dumb for nine months. After 
the child was eight days old the friends of the family came 
together to circumcise it and name it. Some of these 
friends wished to< name the child Zacharias, after his father, 
but his mother said, "Not so; but he shall be called John." 
And when Zacharias was appealed to he wrote : "His name 
is John." Then his tongue, which he had not been able to 
speak with for the space of nine months, was loosened and 
he began to speak and praise God. 

Because of the remarkable things associated with the 
conception and birth of the child the friends were inclined 
to think that the child was designed for some extraordinary 
purpose ; hence they asked the question of the text : "What 
manner of child shall this be?" 

At the birth of every child that comes into the world 
this same question might be asked. Every child is a bundle - 
of wonderful possibilities. 

You may take up the glossy acorn which has fallen at 
your feet, and as you hold it in your hand you may realize 
that mighty results lie folded up within the insignificant 

176 



A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 177 

and apparently inanimate thing. But within it are intricate 
laws of self-development; organs of reproduction that take 
hold on eternity. There are in it a wealth of delicately cut 
leaves in endless succession; the strength of timbers to be 
fashioned hereafter into the roof of a house or to form the 
heart of oak of some great steamship or some man-of- 
war. 

We might ask: "O, foolish little acorn, wilt thou be all 
this" ? And the acorn answers back : "Yes ; God and I." 

If there are wonderful possibilities wrapped up in an 
acorn, there are certainly great possibilities wrapped up in 
every mother's child. 

The question of our text is one that should be asked 
by every parent and teacher of every child. That we are 
interested in our children goes with the saying. But 
whether we are interested sufficiently to cast a forward look 
into the future, in order to see what kind of children they 
will be, is another thing. And are we interested enough to 
shape their lives for the future? We have it in our power 
to do this very largely. Solomon says : "Train up a child 
in the way he should go; and when he is old he will not 
depart from it." But none of us may certainly know what 
manner of children ours shall be, for others may influence 
them for good or evil as well as ourselves. But it belongs 
to us to do our utmost to call out and direct their possibili- 
ties in the right direction. 

That we may see the importance of this I wish to impress 
upon your minds what may be the wonderful reach of their 
lives. There is a beautiful butterfly in the worm that crawls 
at your feet ; there is a giant oak in the acorn which you 
may hold in your hand ; there is an earthquake in the stick 
of dynamite which you may carry in your pocket, and there 
is the making of a great statesman or commentator in the 
dull boy sitting at your feet. 

Dr. Parker says : "Is there anything more incoherent 
than an alphabet? There is not an idea in it. It is dry, 



178 A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 

unmeaning, pointless, utterly without the power to give 
enjoyment. Who can find an organic unity between the let- 
ters of the alphabet as they stand in their separateness and 
their symbolism? They might all be upside down and it 
would make no matter; they might be of different shape 
and no appalling consequence would ensue. The letters of 
any alphabet are incoherent and useless in their separate- 
ness. Yet there is in that alphabet the beginning of logic, 
of music and of eloquence. You do not know what the 
alphabet is until it has undergone manipulation ; after the 
magician has shaped it you shall see visions of God." At 
his birth the infant is \>ut an animal, without discrimination 
or judgment or moral sense. He does not know one being 
from another ; you cannot appeal to him ; you cannot reason 
with him ; you cannot discourse to him about heaven or hell ; 
all your discourse is useless sound. Yet in that same infant 
there may be a judge, a hero, a genius, an Ezekiel. Let us 
not despise the babe in the cradle. He may mean much to this 
world and the next. When Wellington was born at 
Mornington, England, that decided Waterloo and saved 
Europe. When Handel was born in Halle, Saxony, that 
decided the oratorios of "Judas Maccabaeus," and "Esther," 
and "Israel in Egypt," and "Jephtha," and "Messiah." 
When Eli Whitney was born at Westboro that decided all 
the wealth of the cotton fields of the South. When Gut- 
tenberg was born at Metz, Germany that decided all the 
libraries of Christendom. When Morse was born at Breed's 
Hill, Mass., that decided that the lightnings of heaven should 
become galloping couriers, bearing messages over land and 
sea. When Washington was born at Westmoreland, Va., 
that decided American independence. When Christ was 
born at Bethlehem that decided the redemption of the world. 
Oh, look out for the cradles ! 

In one of our recent Sunday-school papers there was an 
article that suggested a "long look versus a short look." 



A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 179 



In all of our work it is well to take a long look as well as 
a short one. In Sunday-school work if you only take a 
short look you may see in a scholar only ,a cross boy or 
a peevish girl. But you need to look farther. What does 
the farmer see in the spring ? Is it only a plow and a balky 
horse? Does he only see tough soil? Yes, all of these, but 
they are only the near view. He takes a long look and by 
it he sees the ripening harvest and the big reaper humbling 
the wheat heads like so many crowned kings, and then the 
heavily loaded wagon rolling off toward the big barn. 

Again, go into the studio. The sculptor stands before 
a block of marble, mallet and chisel in hand. Does he only 
see a shower of marble chips flying like a suddenly disturbed 
flock of white doves? Does he think only of the tiresome, 
monotonous succession of blows? No. He is looking off. 
He sees the shapely statue rising out of the marble litter. 
His eye kindles as he watches the noble face coming into 
outline. He starts in glad surprise as he sees afar a grand 
man or woman as the result of his faithful work. As you 
look upon the child before you what do you see ? Is it only 
the boy or girl, poor and insignificant, or is it the mature 
and fully developed human being at his or her best ? When 
looking down you see in the boys or girls before you irri- 
tating imperfections, and you are tempted to be impatient. 
But look up and wait. Stay the short look.' Lift your eyes. 
Look afar. There you see the once restless, wide-awake 
boy of your class, a splendid Christian man, with his, enthu- 
siastic impulses directed intelligently toward Christ-like ends. 
There you see the girl who tires you out with her schemes 
developed into a magnificent specimen of consecrated 
womanhood, judicious in method and earnest in spirit. So 
take the long look. 

Against the sides of every cradle in which a child is 
rocked beat the two eternities. In that child we have an 
untried, undiscussed and unexplored subject. The influence 



180 A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 

of that child may go clown far into the next century. Yes, 
it may go down into the thirtieth and fortieth and fiftieth 
century, if the world lasts so long. The world stood 4,000 
years before Christ came. It is not unreasonable to sup- 
pose that it will stand many thousand years more. For 4,000 
years the world swung off into sin. May it not during the 
next 4,000 years swing back into righteousness? It is our 
privilege and duty to make it do so. As other fathers and 
mothers and teachers have impressed themselves upon the^ 
past, so we will impress ourselves upon the future. The 
mothers of the last century are today in the persons of their 
descendants, in the senates, the parliaments, the palaces, the 
pulpits, the banking houses, the professional chairs, the 
prisons, the almshouses, the company of midnight brigands, 
the cellars and the ditches of this century. And whether 
our descendants shall drift up or down, not any of us can 
tell. "In Rome," says Dr. Newman, "there are two pic- 
tures painted by the same artist and representing the same 
person. One is the delineation of innocence and the other 
that of guilt. The artist had seen a little child in all the 
beauty of pristine purity and drew its charming features 
on the canvas. Years afterwards, in the streets of Rome, 
he beheld a man with disheveled hair and haggard counte- 
nance and tattered garments — the impersonation of crime. 
That man was once that lovely child." One of our saddest 
reflections is that all the criminals in our penitentiaries, all 
the Magdalens who have gone astray from the paths of vir- 
tue, were once innocent and beautiful children on the bosom 
of maternity. When John Newton, the celebrated clergy- 
man, saw a man being taken away to the scaffold to be 
hanged he said : "There goes John Newton but for the grace 
of God." What depths we may fall to! You cannot tell 
what you are ; that is no ordinary fire that burns in your 
blood. If you want to see what you may become, go to the 
insane asylum. Judas Iscariot was once an innocent child. 
His life was a spotless page, unsullied by any wrong. When 



A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 



181 



his parents bent over the little fellow, no doubt, they felt 
like many another parent that he was the only child in the 
world. They may have said, We will name him Judas, after 
the great patriarch Judah, who was told that he should be 
the ancestor of Christ, and was exalted above his brethren, 
and of whom it was written, "Thou art he whom his breth- 
ren shall praise." The very name Judas, which meant 
"praise" in that day, when every name was given with rela- 
tion to its meaning, embodied the thankfulness of the par- 
ents for their bright and innocent babe. His mother's dream- 
picture of what he was to be was never realized. Such a 
difference is found in many a life between the bright picture 
painted by a mother's hope and the dark scene drawn by 
the son's unfaithfulness — between what should be and 
what is. 

I cannot as fully as some receive the doctrine of the 
depravity of innocent children. I believe the child is a 
beam of sunlight from the infinite and the eternal Father. 
I believe it comes into the world with possibilities both of 
virtue and of vice. In- this babe in the cradle there may be 
a hero or a coward; lips that shall be eloquent with truth 
or shall pour forth corrupting lies ; a fresh breeze from the 
eternal world, sweeping disease and pestilence away, or a 
new form of corruption bringing new disease. He may be 
a Moses or a Pharaoh, a Luther or a Torquemada, a George 
Washington or a Benedict Arnold. Every life is a march 
from innocence, through temptation, to virtue or to vice. 

We receive the children from God, and every one of 
them gives us a great opportunity to do a part of God's 
work in the world. What God is doing in this world is mak- 
ing men and women, and when he puts a child in the cradle, 
he says, You may help me. Wonderful was his work when 
he said, Out of the darkness let light be, and light shone 
upon the world ; wonderful was the effect when on the 
chaotic mass of moving matter he breathed, and out of it 



182 A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 

there came the organized globe. But the most wonderful 
work of all was when he said, Let us make man in our own 
image. To us he comes and says, You may help me do 
this, the grandest work of all; I will give you the little 
child, and out of the little child you may make one who is 
to be godlike. He says it not only to the father and the 
mother, but to the pastor and the teacher. We must have 
much more faith in the religious possibilities of childhood. 
Our theory is all right, but we do not emphasize it with 
that force which shows our confidence that it can be reduced 
to practice. 

Some one has said : "A boy is something like a piece 
of iron, which in its rough state is not worth much, nor 
is it of very much use ; but the more processes it is put 
through the more valuable it becomes. A bar of iron that 
is only worth $5 in its natural state is worth $12 when made 
into horseshoes, and if made into needles it is worth $340 ; 
Made into penknife blades it is worth $3,000; made into 
watch springs it is worth $250,000. 

A boy, like raw iron, in his undeveloped state is com- 
paratively worthless, but he' can be developed into very 
valuable material. Fred Douglass was a poor slave boy; 
but free and educated he was a mighty man. Some one 
once asked him : "At what college — or institution — did .you 
graduate?" He answered: "From the Peculiar institution; 
and my diploma was printed, not on sheepskin, but on my 
own skin. For before I made part of this breathing world 
the chains were forged for my limbs, the whip braided, the 
cewskin twisted — for my back." But that man, whose 
name was registered as property owned by his master, the 
same as horses and cattle, is now gratefully written in the 
histcry of our country and in the Lamb's Book of Life. 

Dear Sunday- school teacher, you cannot tell what that 
little restless boy is going to be. Let your imagination pic- 
ture his future ; see him twenty years from now as a 



A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 183 



teacher, or preacher, or a Christian merchant lawyer or 
statesman, or man of affairs which interest whole communi- 
ties or states. We never know what the future will bring 
forth. I remember once hearing a class in grammar parse 
a sentence in which the word "egg" was under consideration. 

They said : "It is a common noun, singular number, " 

"Well, what gender ?" said the teacher. There was a pause. 
At last one boy put out his hand, indicating that he had an 
answer to the teacher's question. "Well, Johnny?" And the 
lad said : "Please, sir, you cannot tell what gender it is until 
it is hatched." So there is many a child in our Sunday- 
school classes whose future we cannot define, but it is well 
to expect large things of them. 

What Bunyan, Baxter, Howard and Raikes were some 
of our scholars may be. Bunyan is dead, but his bright 
spirit still walks the earth in his "Pilgrim's Progress." Bax- 
ter is dead, but souls are still quickened by his "Saint's Rest." 
Howard is dead, but modern philanthropy is only commenc- 
ing its career. Raikes is dead, but the Sabbath school goes 
on. These were once children like the boys and girls we 
teach from Sabbath to Sabbath. Their devotion to God 
tell our boys what they may be. Of course we cannot expect 
every boy we teach to become great by conceiving or exe- 
cuting some great reform or by projecting some great move- 
ment. But they may all help on every good cause if we 
start them right. Only a few can become great in church 
or state. Only one man, like Thomas Jefferson, could write 
the Declaration of Independence, and only George Wash- 
ington could deliver the first presidential farewell address. 
Only the men who were then upon the scene could consti- 
tute the Constitutional Convention. From that time to this, 
only a great crisis, as the late civil war, could give great men 
an opportunity to impress themselves on the nation. The 
same is true in the church. Certain men, not superior to 
us, not superior to many of their successors, made the con- 



184 A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 

stitutions, settled the creeds, established the forms and 
accomplished everything which gives the state and the 
church its substance and form. While we may not have a 
part in such foundation building, we may carry up the 
structure to the praise of God and the good of man. And 
the boys and girls we teach may play a very important part 
in the drama of the future. They may by our right direc- 
tion be good and useful men and women. 

What, then, shall these children we are training in this 
church be ? What shall they be as to culture ? What shall 
they be as to character ? What shall they be as to their call- 
ing? Will their mission in this world be to bless or curse 
their fellow men? These problems must be solved largely 
by the training we as parents and teachers give; by the 
amount of praying we do, and by the examples and practices 
we set before them. 

Some one has been philosophizing on the possibilities 
in a fountain pen. In Milton's "mighty hand" or in Shakes- 
peare's "high command" what wondrous things it might 
do? With Goethe's touch or Beethoven's soul what emotions 
might it not arouse ? We can conceive what such a pen in 
the hands of a master might accomplish ; but no one can con- 
ceive what God can do with a soul that fully surrenders 
itself to him. Moody's life in a faint way indicates what the 
possibilities might be. 

We should seek the salvation of the children more -zeal- 
ously than we do. The gathering in of these young people 
may be less showy than the conversion of mature neglecters 
and hardened sinners, but in the saving of the children is 
by far the larger promise of the future. Two facts are well 
established: First, that youth presents the most hopeful 
period for Christian effort; and, second, that the child con- 
vert, properly trained, is likely to render greater service to 
the church than the adult convert. The strength of Meth- 
odism today consists largely of persons who were saved in 
early life. 



A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 185 

Childhood is the proper time to ask the question of our 
text: "What then shall this child be?" It is the most 
important period of life. Dean Farrar says : "When a child 
is five years old you have done more than half you can ever 
do to influence him religiously." This same thought has 
been more than once expressed in prose and poetry. 

"Ere your boy has reached to seven 
Teach* him well the way to heaven ; 
Better still the work will thrive 
If he learns before he's five/' 

Massillon, the famous court preacher, counted it a rare 
privilege to preach to the successor of Louis XIV., a boy 
of nine years ; and in a series of sermons he sought to reach 
the heart of the child while he was that young. With the 
skill of a master artist he tried to show him what was his 
duty to the thousands of people who were under his rule, 
and how great was his power to make them miserable or 
happy. He considered the impression to be made on his 
young heart in these first years as all-important and supreme. 

No one who has read biography with carefulness has 
failed to see certain little things, especially in the lives of 
great men, which have turned them away from ignorance, 
or idleness, or error, to a life distinguished for its intelli- 
gence and earnestness. Usually the turning point is in early 
life. It is said of Voltaire that at the age of five years he 
committed to memory an infidel poem, and was never after 
that able to free himself from its pernicious influence. 

William Wilberforce when a child was placed under the 
training of a pious aunt, and, although much was done in his 
early manhood to erase the impressions received from his 
aunt, his whole life was molded and colored by that same 
training. 

Hume was quite young when he took the wrong side in 
a debate, and he ever after defended that same position 



186 A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 



through life. A wrong start in youth may mean a life of 
wrongdoing for years. 

The sad thing about life's reflections is that the criminal 
classes are kept full from year to year. And they are 
recruited from our families. As we look into the face of 
one of our boys and ask, "What then shall this child be?" 
how shall we answer the question? The criminals of today 
will soon have all passed into the grave. Who will fill our 
prisons and reformatories a score of years hence? Who, of 
the next generation, will supply the daily records of bur- 
glary, and arson, licentiousness and murder ? Shall they be 
your children and mine? If we neglect them and let them 
drift into the society of criminals, or fall into the lap of vice, 
where they shall become familiar with all kinds of corrup- 
tion, what else can we expect? We must save the children 
if we would have good men and women. But we will not 
make the necessary effort in this direction until we are 
impressed with their possibilities. 

If you only regard the boy in his animal capacity your 
efforts will, of course, be scarcely worth making. But if 
you think of him as in germ a man, a citizen, a thinker, a 
Christian, a philosopher, a teacher and a leader of noble 
enterprises, your best sympathies and prayers will be worth 
something. The darkness and difficulty you now experience 
in helping him will be lighted up with hope, inspiring you to 
look forward to the better days that are to be. But if the 
future is to be bright the present must be employed. 

If we consider the intellectual, moral and spiritual worth 
of our children it will be something to us whether an angel 
or a devil trains and educates them. We cannot afford to 
trust them to teachers in the streets, or in dens of vice, or put 
into their hands such literature as shall corrupt them. 

But it is not sufficient to give them good teachers ; we 
ought to give them a good example. Just as sure as men 
may transmit to their children peculiarities of hair, eyes and 



A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 187 



lip, so sure you may transmit to 'them a skeptical or a reli- 
gious tendency. Many of the parents who rejoice in their 
pious children, and many are the parents who grieve over 
their own errors reproduced in their offspring. 

There is much help and inspiration to parents, to teach- 
ers and ambitious youth in the couplet : 

"Lives of great men all remind us. 
We can make our lives sublime." 

Many of these great men who are a source of inspiration 
to us were once poor boys like our own. A few years ago 
there was held in London a flower show that was quite excep- 
tional ' in interest, because all the blooms exhibited were 
grown within the borders of the crowded metropolis. It 
is comparatively easy to grow flowers in the pure air of the 
country, under blue skies, in the clear sunlight, amid the 
refreshing rains and silvery dew ; no wonder that blossoms 
in such pleasant places come to a rapid and delightful per- 
fection. But the flowers of the exhibit of which I am speak- 
ing were grown, many of them in alleys, in back yards, on 
the tiles, in cramped boxes on window sills, in cellars and 
attics, in dingiest corners and forlornest districts ; all of 
them were grown amid dust and grime and smoke and fog, 
and the breath of the million. Here was a victory indeed ; 
a grand triumph over adverse conditions. Such a show was 
full of interest and pathos, and no wonder that royalty, 
together with the brilliant crowd, was present to witness so 
brilliant and affecting a spectacle. But the same thing has 
happened again and again in the production of brilliant men 
from unlikely places. 

Lord Shaftsbury thought the street boys of London 
were worth saving. He showed this by going down among 
them and associating with them so as to lift them up. How 
worth saving must your boy and mine be when the Son of 
God came down from heaven to save him? And we cannot 



188 A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 

tell what that saved boy may become. Results are not 
always measured by numbers. That meeting in which only 
a colored man and a flaxen-haired boy were converted over 
a half century ago was not set down as much of a success, 
but that boy was Bishop Simpson, and measured by that fact 
the meeting was one of the most successful of the last hun- 
dred years. 

The records of the last hundred years are filled with 
achievements and progress that astonish the world. But 
the book that contains the history of the Church of Christ 
during the past century is also crowded with wonders and 
blessings that call for the deepest gratitude. The history 
of modern Sunday-school work is nearly all recorded in this 
volume, and this work is admitted to rank among the great 
things of the century. No one can overestimate the impor- 
tance and promise of this work. I solemnly believe that in 
the work performed, in the results secured and in the 
expenses incurred the Sunday-school is the most important, 
the most hopeful and the most economical agency known. 

A great writer has said: "In the great and awful con- « 
flict between truth and error, between faith and unbelief, 
between morality and virtue on the one side and immorality 
and vice on the other side; between temperance and intem- 
perance, between liberty and lawlessness, the side that gains 
the children will secure the victory, and the side that loses 
the children will suffer defeat. The destiny of America is 
in the hands of the children." If these children are rightly 
led and truly taught by faithful teachers our country will be 
safe, otherwise not. If they are neglected and untaught the 
danger is appalling. Hence we are to a great extent respon- 
sible for the future. Great and expanding as this thought 
is when applied to our own country, it increases as we re- 
member that America has much to do in deciding the destiny 
of the world. 

The best place to begin our work is nearest home, and 
the best time is nozv. Let us take hold of these young minds 



A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 189 



while they are plastic. Children may know the Lord very 
early in life. Samuel knew the Lord when but a boy. Good 
King Josiah knew the Lord when but eight years old. Timo- 
thy knew the scriptures from a child. Baxter embraced the 
Savior when but a youth; Jonathan Edwards at the age of 
seven; Watts, the great poet, at nine; Matthew Henry, the 
great commentator, at eleven, and Robert Hall at twelve. 

During the Christian Endeavor Convention at Chicago 
one of the delegates, a young business man, dressed in a 
natty rough-and-ready suit, every movement alert and eager 
and telling of bottled energy within, came suddenly upon 
a red-faced citizen, who evidently had been patronizing the 
hotel bar. Buttonholing the delegate a trifle unceremo- 
niously, the latter said : "What are you fellows trying to do 
down at the Battery ? You are hot on temperance, I see by 
the papers. Do you think you could make a temperance 
man of me ?" "No," replied the delegate, looking him over 
from head to foot with a keen glance, slightly contemptuous, 
"we evidently couldn't do much with you, but we are after 
your boy." At this unexpected retort the man dropped his 
jocular tone and said, seriously: "Well, I guess you have 
got the right of it there. If somebody had been after me 
when I was a boy I should be a better man today." 

Save the boys and the girls. Who can tell what God 
may make of some of them ? The world will need great and 
good men in the future as in the past. And some of the 
boys and girls you are working with now may be the future 
law-makers, prophets, reformers, organizers and leaders of 
great movements. They may be the Pauls, the Luthers, the 
Wesleys, the Lucretia Motts and the Frances Willards of 
the future. It doth not yet appear what any child shall be. 
But because of the glorious possibilities wrapped up in every 
one of our boys and girls in our Sunday-school, let us do 
our best to make them great and good. 



190 A PROBLEM FOR PARENTS AND TEACHERS. 



BOYS ARE WANTED. 

Boys of spirit, boys of will, 

Boys of muscle, brain, and power, 

Fit to cope with anything — 
These are wanted every hour. 

Not the weak and whining drones, 
That all trouble magnify — 

Not the watchword of "I can't," 
But the nobler one, "I'll try." 

Though your duty may be hard, 
Look not on it as an ill ; 

If it be an honest task, 
Do it with an honest will. 

At the anvil, or the farm, 
Wheresoever you may be, 

From your future efforts, boys, 
Comes a nation's destiny. 



GIRLS ARE WANTED. 

The girls that are wanted are good girls — 

Good from the heart to the lips, 
Pure as the lily is white and pure 

From its heart to its sweet leaf-tips. 

The girls that are wanted are home girls — 

Girls that are mother's right hand, 
That fathers and mothers can trust in, 

And the little ones understand — 

Girls that are fair on the hearthstone, 

And pleasant when nobody sees; 
Kind and sweet to their own folks, 

Ready and anxious to please. 

'The girls that are wanted are wise girls, 

That know what to do and say, 
That drive with a smile and a loving word 

The gloom of the household awa>. 

Helen Hall Farley. 

God give us such boys and girls ! 




I 



THE HIDDEN WORD/ 



BY REV. J. A. LUCAS, A. M., D. D. 

Pastor at Carlinville. 

"Thy word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against 
thee." — Psalm 119: 11. 

Augustine, after his conversion from Paganism, left be- 
hind him a most remarkable influence upon the church, be- 
cause of the hidden word in his life. Chrisostom, "the 
golden mouthed," swayed, as if by magic, the multitudes 
under the mighty stimulus acquired by treasuring in mem- 
ory the word of God. Libanius said : "What wonderful 
women these Christians have." He saw the wonderful influ- 
ence exerted over the children, by the mother, in storing 
the mind with scriptures. So taught, the great philoso- 
phers and the priests were unable to win to heathenism the 
children of these Christian women. 

St. Paul puts no less stress on the word when he speaks 
"of the unfeigned fajth" in Timothy, in grandmother Lois, 
and in mother Eunice. So might many others who have 
made brilliant records in the early church be cited, in 
accordance with the thought of the Psalmist. If the text 
applied well to the Fathers, why not to us ? It leads us to 
say : 

I. That which enters our life should have a permanent 
value. 

Shams cover defects and must soon give way to reveal 
that which they hide. So if permanency and stability are 
to be secured, nothing but the genuine and the best should 

191 



192 



THE HIDDEN WORD. 



be permitted to enter the life. Christ was extremely pains- 
taking, for he selected divinity as the chief cornerstone in 
God's great masonry. 

These are days when men are dealing in real values. 
Everything in the world has its unit 'of value. In the com- 
mercial and monetary world, it is the dollar, and on this 
unit of value is the entire globe rated. And the standard is 
kept pure and perfect, from the commercial standpoint. In 
no other way, or on no other basis, can a man pass muster ; 
and from it there is absolutely no appeal. The almighty 
dollar is the supreme ruler of finance, and with right royal 
mandate does it sway its scepter without any probability of 
disaster, or any fear of being dethroned. Kings and na- 
tions pay obeisance to this mighty ruler, and rightly admit 
its permanency in value. You need not ask why; this is 
already obvious. 

So, also, has everything else a standard of value, if it 
amounts to anything. There is education with its inexora- 
ble law, as stern and unwieldy as finance ever dared to be. 
Scholarship is its motto, and with breathless spirit it plunges 
itself into the vortex of the busy world and snatches the 
cover from the pretender, with an agility that amazes, and 
a determination that bodes all fear. To appear to be and 
not to be, is only to be embarrassed, when the scrutiny comes 
that discriminates with the nicest exactness. 

We would not for one moment challenge the unit of 
value when it is pure and always brings a par value. ' Why 
should we ? Doing so would make life changeable as a 
value. 

But there is still a higher standard, and one having 
greater permanency, nobler stability and more exquisite 
beauty than that found in the financial world or the educa- 
tional ; it is the life spiritual. We would never minimize the 
other required standards. Keep them high and steadfast. 
Never swerve from the unit that is always worth its face 



?HE HIDDEN WORD. 



193 



everywhere. But in the Christian life there is a unit of 
value of such priceless worth that it passes the test of two 
worlds* 

You may have any or all of these, but be sure that you 
have the standard that is secured by the life hid with God. 

1. Every man wants to excel in what he undertakes in 
life* The desire for so doing is a noble impulse given of 
God and may be called ambition. Now to make this ambi- 
tion noble, and of supreme worth we return to the thought 
we so often meet, namely, "seek ye first the kingdom of 
God and his righteousness; and all these things shall be 
added unto you." Were not the tablets from Sinai and the 
summary from Christ, sent or given, to inspire ambition and 
push man out to do his best? 

2. Every man may excel by diligent application and 
tact. 

"Go to the ant, thou sluggard," has in it a wise lesson. 
To follow it, and that diligently, we get the incentive to 
apply ourselves. Some one has said : "Keep everlastingly 
at it and you will succeed." That is evidently true if we 
prepare ourselves according to well tried plans and meth- 
ods ; such as have proven themselves golden. There is 
certainly no room for the idler. He would just as well dis- 
appear from the scene at once. 

But to reach the highest success, there must be brought 
into play that noble faculty called tact. What is this al- 
together-too-little-used and too-scarce-factor? It is that 
which not only makes the most of every opportunity, but it 
is the genius that invents opportunity and then puts it 
into splendid practice. We may not all be -splendid tac- 
ticians, but no one need be too deficient to discover the best 
methods of doing some important things perfectly. In so 
doing you may excel. 

Never was the world so busy as today. It seems one 
mad rush, and in every avenue the crowd surges hither and 



194 



THE HIDDEN WORD. 



thither, as if there were but one thing to do, and that must be 
done at once. That is exactly the principle that God wants 
carried out in his work. Now if we select the right meth- 
ods in our hermeneutics we will succeed and excel. But 
the utmost care must be exercised in discriminating. 

Our fathers worked from sun to sun, but they also slept 
at night. ; They lived in the quiet hamlet or on the uninter- 
rupted farm. They knew of no such terms as "sharp com- 
petition" or "options for a day." They moved slowly and 
deliberately. Nervous disorder was almost unknown to 
them. The slavish demands of society put its shackles on 
none. They were all-purpose people, and they, were not 
hampered for time. But now there is no use for the all- 
purpose man. He is Out of date, and out of tune, with busi- 
ness as well as religion. Now the man must be a specialist 
in business and religion. We must be like Wesley, who 
said he was a man of one book : "Homo unius libre." We 
must be men of one purpose, men of one aim, men of culti- 
vated mind, men of skilled hand and pure hearts. 

3. The instrumentalities we employ must accord with 
God's plans. 

Let the great burning light of truth be turned on with 
its cheering rays, and all indisposition disappears. Then 
on the throne of judgment will appear "a workman that 
needeth not be ashamed," espousing for righteousness sake, 
God's supreme plans ; not for policy's sake, but for the sake 
of righteousness. 

Inasmuch as God is perfect in all of his attributes, we 
cannot fail if we employ the instrumentalities he enjoins. 
They are in the word, they are of God. What we need is to 
know them. "Search the scriptures ; they testify of- me. 
Hide the word in the heart and sin not." Even though we 
may be burdened with the cares of life, we must be pano- 
plied with the holy safeguard, namely, the Word, if we ex- 
pect the greatest success. Indeed, every suggestion indi- 
cates that we need the Bible. 



THE HIDDEN WORD. 



195 



(a) It gives us character. 

How well David and Paul knew this ! And God so well 
knows the worth of character that he has provided an un- 
failing scheme and an unfailing guide. What is character? 
Is it reputation? By no means. Character is what we are. 
Reputation is what the people say we are. How necessary 
that we should discriminate at this point! Everything de- 
pends on it. To do so we only need to know the Book; 
for it is the sword of the Spirit, the eternal truth, the guide 
of life, the builder of character. 

(b) It is the revelation of the future life. 

It is not the bible of the Saddusees with worn traditions 
and denials of immortality, but the Bible of the immaculate 
Christ, who endorses righteousness and purity, and assures 
us that there are many mansions prepared for us in heaven. 
It is the Bible of John, who saw a great throng which no 
man' can number, and the hundred and forty and four thou- 
sand, and people from every nation, and the Lamb, before 
whom they were arrayed in white robes and palms in their 
hands. "These are they which came out of great tribula- 
tion, and they washed their robes, and made them white in 
the blood of the Lamb." "He shall wipe away every tear 
from their eyes; and death shall be no more." 

Science finds no way out of the difficulty in its solution 
of immortality. Rationalism, I think, is a better word than 
science, in this connection; for this so-called science is 
nothing but an attempt to apply the reason in an effort to 
discover immortality. Many of these rationalistic scientists 
boast that the fathers knew nothing of science, of which they 
are masters. What if they did know little of science? 
What of their lives? Many of them have gone; their lives 
have been rounded out with beautiful Christian experiences, 
and their experiences and their dying testimonies are far 
better proof than that of any of the modern rationalists. 
Hear them speak. John Wesley said : "The best of all is : 



196 



THKoHIDDEN WORD. 



God is with us." Daniel Webster said: "Lord I believe; 
help thou my unbelief." Andrew Jackson left this for his 
dying testimony: "My sufferings, though great, are not 
to be compared to those of my dying Saviour, through 
whose death I look for everlasting happiness." Thousands 
of testimonies as good as the above are on record. What 
noble proof they are of immortality ! 

That some may be convinced that rationalism or agnos- 
ticism was not satisfactory in the dying hour, I quote from 
a few noted persons : Voltaire made this statement to his 
physician : "I will give you half of what I am worth if 
you will give me six months of life." Grotius, the histo- 
rian, said : "I have consumed my life in a laborious doing 
of nothing. I would give all my glory and honor for the 
plain integrity of John Urick" — a poor man of eminent 
piety. What better proof do we need than such testimonies 
in the dying hour. Will you have the Bible or rationalism 
for your guide? 

You may have buried your mother recently; go to the 
astronomer, ask him to relieve you of your dire distress, by 
pointing his mammoth telescope toward the sky, that he 
may point out to you that mother that you so much desire to 
see at this supreme moment. Such science only mocks you. 
How powerless the scientist and his telescope ! No help 
here for poor broken hearts ! Come ^way from such poor 
succor. "Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy 
laden, and I will give you rest." You must come back to 
God if you would have life and have it abundantly. 

You lowered that little boy's body into the tomb, yet 
it is but his body, but how concerned you are ! You believe 
science can relieve you, then try the geologist, he knows 
about the strata of old mother earth. He may pierce with 
keenest vision to the earth's very center, but what does he 
give you that helps you in your dilemma ? Absolutely noth- 
ing. It is all hollow mockery. Go back to God, ye deceived 
men of false doctrine. 



THE HIDDEN WORD. 



197 



4. God's word alone consoles us. 

"I am the resurrection and the life." This was the com- 
fort of the fathers, it's ours. Nothing, positively nothing, 
reconciles the bereaved but the word of Almighty God. A 
young lady of rare beauty and accomplishments prema- 
turely came to her last sickness. She had studied with the 
masters of the Old World. In music, art and literature she 
was proficient. On yon gallery's wall hangs the beautiful 
painting that the masters praise. She, too, is a linguist of 
marked ability. But now she can no longer use the brush 
or manipulate the keys of the piano to bring out its sweetest 
melodies. She no longer revels in Browning, Shakespeare, 
or indeed in any of her once favorite authors. If not in 
these, then, in what does she find her enjoyment? Let us 
ask and see. She says, when asked, "Please read to me the 
twenty-third Psalm. And if you will I should like to hear 
from John in his gospel, from the fourteenth chapter." 
Said she : "Sing for me that good old hymn, 'All Hail the 
Power of Jesus' Name,' and 

Take myjife, and let it be 
Consecrated, Lord, to Thee." 

And then, after singing these beautiful hymns, talk with 
God in my behalf." She finds in these last hours of life 
her consolation in what the poet says : "My God is recon- 
ciled." And this was her last comfort. 

II. God's word gives its own interpretation. 

We need not be puzzling about the outcome, if we hide 
the word in the heart ; for it is of permanent value and will 
bear choice fruit. 

You need not study higher criticism, or delve in the 
archives of the musty past to understand what God wants. 
Jesus gave us an honest interpretation of the Jewish scrip- 
tures and made them burn with eternal truth in his two 
commandments : "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, and 



198 



THE HIDDEN WORD. 



thy neighbor as thyself." Is not this plain? Let the dear 
old saints of God, who punctuated their Bibles with pre- 
cious tears of joy, be consulted, rather than the originator 
of a theory by which you shall be governed in getting God's 
meaning out of his own word. Keep your own meaning 
out, and let God speak by the divine illumination, through 
his Holy Spirit, in answer to prayer. 

1. At the time needed you will understand. 

A most exemplary Christian woman once said in an 
earnest prayer, at a church altar: "Lord, save my two 
grown daughters ! I am willing to pay the price, only save 
my daughters !" In less than one week the price was paid, 
for God took to himself, as the price, a little daughter of 
ten summers. On being asked if she thought the price was 
not too great, she instantly replied : "No ; it cost me much, 
but not too much ; for while my little Nellie has gone home 
to live with God, my two elder daughters have been saved, 
and are now happy Christians. I never knew until now 
what God meant when he said : 'All things work together 
for good to them that love God,' but I know now. It is so 
clear to my mind. If we buf pay the price God will 
make known his will to us. My prayer was answered, and 
I am now fully reconciled to his will, believing that all scrip- 
ture is true." So the right exegesis is always given when 
it is needed. 

2. The Spirit in the interpretation of God's Word is 
safe. 

Seek not the counsel of disclaimers or complainers, but 
remember that "he showeth knowledge," and "his spirit 
guideth into all truth." In this day of corruption and 
wickedness we need the safest guide. We do not need 
to read from the agnostic, spiritualist, or pantheist, or even 
from the rationalist that we may know their ways of sin. 
Neither do we want the experience of the leper, or that of 
the man in the tombs to better understand the right way. « 



THE HIDDEN WORD. 



199 



It is not necessary that we shall know sin in order to be 
noble Christians. A pilot was once asked if he knew where 
the snags in the river are. He promptly replied: "No, 
I do not. But I know where they are not." So it is not 
necessary that we should know sin in order to keep in the 
path of safety. 

Let the scriptures be studied under the supreme guidance 
of the holy spirit's illumination and with the mind of Christ. 
Then sin will not abound in the heart of such a student. 
"Study to show thyself a workman." If with this spirit 
we bring all our conclusion to an issue we will cry out in 
accord with the prophet, "As the heavens are high above 
the earth, so are his ways higher than our ways, and his 
thoughts higher than our thoughts." Such was the mind 
of the psalmist when he urged us to hide his word in our 
hearts. This was done that we might not sin and being 
more like God that we. might continually rise heavenward. 



) 



THE PURPOSES OF CHRIST'S COMING. 

BY REV. RICHARD G. HOBBS, PH.D. 

Springfield, Illinois. 

"I am come that they might have life, and that they might have 
it more abundantly." — John 10:10. 

He who fares forth in the first spring days, walks in pres- 
ence of nature's annual miracle. The dead is coming to 
life. The sheets of ice and snow, the grave clothes of the 
earth have been laid aside. The rivers and brooks run 
free again. The south wind moves among the swelling 
buds soon to unfold their silken leaves in the sunshine. 
Countless emerald lances cover the meadows. The flow- 
ers begin to creep up out of the dark earth. The hypatica, 
brave little blossom of the earliest spring, comes to life. 
Violets wake up in the fence corners, and spread out 
their modest beauty in quiet places, just as blue and bright 
as when you plucked them in the old days on your way to 
the old country school house. 

All the flowers wake up and blossom out in beauty. The 
peach tree with its pink glory, the cherry tree with its 
white glory, and the apple tree with its fragrance that lifts 
you and carries you clear back across the years to the old 
orchard where you first heard the drowsy hum of the 
bees and the plaintive song of the robins. A power 
strange and mysterious moves across the face of the 
earth, and where there were brown fields, and naked 
trees, and bare hedges, a dreary, lifeless landscape, there is 
abounding life. It is simply the dead come to life again. 
It is one of God's ways of telling us that his purpose for the 
world is not death, but life. 

209 



/ 



THE PURPOSES OF CHRIST'S COMING. ■ 201 

Larger life, evermore larger life for men, is the central 
purpose of Jesus' mission to the world. You can trace to 
the foot of the cross and the open tomb all those fine en- 
thusiasms, and all those concerted movements, which have 
brought about our Christian civilization. Wherever Jesus 
has touched human life he has caused it to blossom into 
beauty and nobility. Men have ceased from their bitter 
hatreds as they have yielded their hearts to his service. 

Life comes from him. His word brought life where be- 
fore there was chaos. He spoke, and the world was peo- 
pled. First came the things that live, but do not breathe: 
or think. Then humble forms of life moved to and fro> 
upon the earth, ere man had left the hand of the Creator, 
fashioned in the image of his God. At length the epoch 
dawned when the chief work of the Lord's hand was to be 
set in the light of the sun, and man was formed. Life 
came from the Master. 

But life, apart from knowledge of Jesus Christ, is a 
poor thing for men. When sin had put a barrier between 
God and man, and spiritual ignorance had deadened all the 
fine and lofty aspirations of the human soul, men lived mean 
lives. Their homes were huts. Their ambitions were but 
little raised above the savage instincts of the brutes. Their 
only law was the law of rude force. They lived in constant 
strife. Men might be ignorant of all gentle arts, but must 
be skillful to construct the implements of war. They lived 
with scarcely any aspiration beyond the next meal of half- 
cooked food. When they became less savage they were not 
less selfish. Their cruelties were more refined, but not less 
torturing. The oppression and suffering of men in the 
Persian and Roman empires were as great as when men 
lived in ruder ways. With slaves and the poor life was one 
long agony. No Christly philanthropy to bring any soft- 
ening of their hard and cruel fate. No class was free from 
fear. When war came, and tl)at was perpetually, a success- 



202 THE PURPOSES OF CHRIST'S COMING. 

ful foe would put the people to the sword. When there 
was a change of kings, blood flowed, for the friends of the 
discarded dynasty must be put out of the way. But the 
time would fail me to tell of the unhappy conditions of those 
who lived in Christless lands and times. 

I came, Jesus says, that they might have life, and that 
they might have it more abundantly. The nineteen Chris- 
tian centuries that are past prove the truth of that state- 
ment. The purpose has not been without its fruit. Where- 
ever Christ has touched the life of these centuries it has 
been to quicken its movement and increase its force. And 
where has he not laid his awakening hand? Art has felt 
the power of that touch. The galleries of the old world 
are ablaze with a glory of color. As I have walked through 
the corridors of those splendid palaces of art and looked 
upon the marvelous works of genius — genius which has 
been employed to set forth the person of him who rises the 
chief figure of all time — to depict the pathetic face of her 
who bowed in love and wonder above the cradle of the in- 
fant Christ, the gentle mother of our Lord, the genius which 
has set forth so vividly the scenes of holy writ — I have 
thought I could guess why those great artists are called the 
masters. No others have rivaled them because no others 
have so drawn their inspiration from the word of life. 
They saw him who is invisible. The inward vision with 
them was not clouded. They painted marvelously because 
they saw clearly. 

Architecture owes its finer monuments to the Christian 
religion. The cathedral at Milan is a dream in marble. 
Westminster Abbey is a poem in stone. St. Peter's at 
Rome is a great stone prayer. It has been thought by 
some that the splendid temple which crowned the Acropolis 
in Athens was the finest structure of all time. But what 
was that Parthenon save a plagiarism from Solomon's tem- 
ple ? The best things in the Grecian structure were copied 



THE PURPOSES OP CHRIST'S COMING. 203 



from the matchless temple on Mt. Zion, and where did the 
plan for that come from but from the Lord of heaven, who 
rose victorious on Easter morning from his conflict with 
man's great, foe? Put dynamite under all the splendid 
buildings which owe their existence to the Lord Jesus and 
his religion, the world would be robbed of its best. Sweep 
away all structures which are upon the earth because Chris- 
tianity is here and it may be doubted whether there would 
be anything left but the dug-out or the mud and stick hovels 
of the savages. 

Music has been made richer by this master of life. There 
is no finer music than that of the oratorios produced by men 
who swept the chords of melody under the inspiration of the 
Bible. 

Literature is richer because of Jesus' influences. His 
words have been like seeds — for each word a good book has 
grown to bless the world. 

In government see what Christ has done for the people. 
Today government is not for the few, but for the many. 
That is because Jesus reached down by his teachings and 
took a man who was low-born and set him beside the king 
and said to them, "Ye be brethren." The principle of the 
common brotherhood of man, first distinctly announced 
and clearly maintained by the Lord Jesus, explains the 
larger freedom brought to men by Christian governments. 
Civil liberty is rooted in Christian teachings. 

See what he has done for particular classes — the slave 
for instance. In every Christian land the slave's fetter is 
riven and he stands up in the light of the sun a free man. 

The risen Christ has wrought larger life for woman. 
Her condition in most heathen lands is appalling, and no- 
where beyond the shadow of the cross has she the place 
which is her due. The loftiest of heathen teachers have 
done little or nothing to make her condition less wretched. 
Jesus alone of all the great teachers has honored woman. 



204 



THE PURPOSES OF CHRIST'S COMING. 



But when Christ said, "I am come that they might have 
life," he did not mean in this world only. There is a legend 
which tells how a certain country was held in terror by a 
monster which threatened to destroy the lives of all in the 
land. The bravest and strongest strove against the terri- 
ble thing, which was half beast and half serpent, but lost 
their lives in the endeavor. The "king offered the half of 
his realm to any one who could rid the land of the scourge, 
but no spear was hurled skillfully enough to pierce.it, no 
sword was swung strongly enough to slay it. One after 
another the people were vanquished by the destroyer, whose 
appetite for men was never sated. 

The land which that destroying monster lived in we will 
call Earth; to the monster himself we may give the name 
Death. No enemy was ever more fiercely assaulted. 
Science has been put under perpetual tax to furnish weapons 
against him. Clever doctors have come to the aid of suffer- 
ing humanity, and have given to men a temporary advant- 
age over the unseen destroyer. Every possible means of 
prolonging life and outwitting death has been resorted to. 
Can death be conquered? The question is answered; the 
destroyer destroyed. He who says, "I am the resurrection 
and the life," holds up the broken fetters of the grave when 
he says it, and heaven and earth hail him conqueror. 

To lift the curtain or rend the veil of death before a 
man is to change him, in his own consciousness, from a 
worm into an immortal. It has an amazing influence on his 
conduct. If he is to die without hope tomorrow, he lives 
without hope today. He is narrow, time-serving, selfish, 
limited in every way. But when he gets hold upon this 
pregnant truth of immortality he is a new creature. Little 
things no longer jostle him. When a man knows that 
he is to live, he walks with a swift foot over that which to 
one of narrow hopes would prove an effective barrier. He 
is not going to die tomorrow. He has all eternity before 



THE PURPOSES OF^CHRIST'S COMING. 205 

him. He can stop to stoop and help up a fallen brother. 
He has time to spare. He can bear the failure of some 
earthly plans for these are not his all. He can cheerfully 
bestow his money upon the needy for he does not rely for 
happiness upon possessing money. He lives a large, wide 
life. The truth has made him. free. He has come to pos- 
sess life as Christ meant men should. 

So complete is Christ's victory over death that even 
these bodies shall wake from the sleep of the tomb. Here 
is a dish of acid into which you drop a silver dollar. The 
acid consumes it and through the clear liquid you cannot 
see anything left of the shining metal. You ask if it is pos- 
sible to get the dollar back again. A chemist standing by 
says, "Yes." He takes a re-agent and pours into the acid. 
The lost dollar falls to the bottom of the dish, every particle 
of it. It is carried to the mint, molded and stamped, and 
you have your dollar again. The chemist's promise is ful- 
filled. And shall not God, who knows all the processes of 
nature, who can play force against force more skillfully 
than man can play one chemical process against another, 
shall not God keep his promise and bring the body back 
from the dissolution of the grave? 

The larger life which Jesus brings to his people involves 
the restoration of our friends. Life in eternity would not 
be, could not be, large and full without them. We shall 
have our lost friends back again. Not for a brief moment, 
but for eternity. No brief reunion could satisfy our hearts ; 
no mere whisper from the other world bring us comfort in 
our longing for companionship with the lost. Like Lao- 
damia we might pray for three hours' reunion with our 
dead. At her prayer her husband's shade returned, so the 
legendary story runs. With glad surprise she fed her soul 
for three brief hours upon his face and voice and love, and 
then he disappeared to return no more. Laodamia fell 
fainting on the palace floor, and expired in an agony of 



206 THE PURPOSES OF CHRIST'S COMING. 



grief. No brief return of the loved ones could bring us 
lasting joy. It is not thus that Jesus seeks to satisfy our 
hearts. By the resurrection he restores the lost to us for- 
ever, and no hand of death will come to break the tender 
ties which bind us to them. 

Christ's coming was the advent of life for all the world — 
pure life, high thought, broad charity, a golden age. 

Christ's death meant the destruction of sin which hampers 
human nature in its growth, blocks the way of human 
progress, feeds upon the virtue, blights the beauty, saps 
the strength, destroys the hopes of human kind. 

Christ's resurrection meant, for his people, an eternal 
victory over death, a truth which may well set our hearts 
to singing. Once two women went into a garden with 
broken hearts. They had walked through a sleeping city 
to reach the place. The morning was just beginning to 
break. They were hurrying to the grave of the best friend 
they had ever had. As they came to the tomb and stood 
before it they saw a miracle. The stone which blocked 
its entrance, too heavy for them to move, had been rolled 
aside, and upon it sat an angel announcing to them the 
resurrection of their friend, the world's Redeemer, the now 
triumphant Christ. That was the brightest morning this 
world ever saw ; a radiant morning for the two women, 
whose weeping was turned into joy; a radiant morning for 
every one who ever had stood or ever would stand weeping 
at a graveside. When Jesus came to earth a throng of 
angels caroled his advent, but no angel choir could voice the 
rapture of the resurrection morning. That was reserved 
for other tongues. Only those who should lie in the dark- 
ness of the tomb, and then break from its thralldom, would 
be able to celebrate the might of him through whose power 
their victory would be won. The song is not yet sung. It 
awaits the gathering of the singers. When Christ's resur- 
rection has borne its full fruit in the resurrection of all 



THE PURPOSES OF CHRIST'S COMING. 207 

his people, the time will have come for the mighty chorus. 
It will roll in thunderous volume under the arches of heaven, 
and the words of the song will be these : "Blessing, and 
honor, and glory, and power be unto him that sitteth upon 
the throne, and unto the Lamb forever and ever." 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



BY W. A. SMITH, D.D., 

Presiding Elder of the Springfield District. 

"There was a man sent from God whose name was John." — 
John i : 6. 

The time is the transition period between the Old Dis- 
pensation and the New. John the Baptist is the best rep- 
resentative of that period that all history furnishes. He 
stands on the dividing line between the two, crying out the 
old and calling in the new. He was the last of the line of 
prophets. He was the first of the preachers of the new 
righteousness and the new kingdom. Moses introduced 
the period of the law. Samuel introduced the period of the 
prophets. But John the Baptist introduced the kingdom 
of heaven, which he declared to be then at hand, and which 
has been coming more and more largely through the years 
as they have come and gone. John was the first preacher, 
for the office of preacher arose with John and Jesus. Be- 
fore that there were teachers, prophets, priests, but no 
preachers. He was first, however, only in order — never 
first in rank. That distinction must ever belong to him who 
came heralded by John. He is immeasurably greater than 
John. He infinitely outmeasures Moses. He is vastly 
superior to Paul. He came as the great Original* bearing 
about him none of the marks of local origin or hered- 
itary descent. He was the first great Christian preacher, 
towering above all others, stepping into the center of all 
-observation, challenging the faith and worship of the world, 



208 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



209 



and crying : "Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends 
of the earth." John was a missionary preacher, but that idea 
was not born with him. It is- of different parentage and of 
older birth. It is a child of heaven. Its nativity is in the 
skies. Its father is God. It was conceived away back in 
the ages by him who, with one sweep of his omnipotent 
arm sent the worlds flying from his finger ends through 
space, and who, speaking to those whom he recognized as 
his own equal, said : "Let us make man, in our image, after 
our likeness." It has come down to us from ages hoary 
with antiquity. It has come by way of Egypt, and Babylon, 
and Palestine, and Greece, and Rome, and England. In 
one sense it had its earthly birth in the times of John and 
Jesus; but it was born then only in the sense of clothing 
with flesh and blood this divine idea — this deathless pur- 
pose. It is now in the mighty travail of the new birth 
and is taking on more and more of the power of Omnipo- 
tence, for it is surcharged with divine dynamics. Christ 
came to translate this idea to men and convert it into a form 
in which it should be operative upon human life. He 
tremendously succeeded. Henceforth it is to be God's great 
purpose in the swing of the earth and the movements of the 
universe. How is that purpose to find manifestation? 

The truth is revealed in the text and in the book that 
man is to be largely the savior of men. John "was a man sent 
from God." "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among 
us, full of grace and truth/' the fullness of truth and the 
completeness of redemptive grace, that he might save man. 
It is an old truth that has found illustration and demon- 
stration over and over again in the history of the past that 
humanity must be saved, if at all, through human agency. 
God might have commissioned angels to do his work, and 
perform his will, but he did not. He might have saved the 
Eunuch without the kind ministry of Philip, but he did not 
do so. He might have caused the light to flash into the 



210 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



soul of Saul to disperse its darkness as he had made it to 
burst upon his vision with such dazzling brilliancy as to pro- 
duce blindness, without the helpful aid of Ananias, but he 
did not do it, and in his infinite wisdom he must have selected 
the very best means possible for the accomplishment of his 
purpose. So far as we know, Christ himself, with all his 
almightiness, could not have saved humanity without putting 
on our nature. He might have done so, but he would not 
have been our Jesus, coming to us with his locks wet with the 
morning dews after he had spent a whole night in prayer 
for us. I freely admit that the God-man is an incompre- 
hensible mystery to us. Now he has the gentleness of the 
infant in its mother's arms, and now the force of the light- 
ning rending the tower. These are the seals which God 
places on his own work, and without these our knees would 
never bow to the Savior and our lips would never speak 
his praise. But we must have a Savior whom we can ap- 
proach, and who can draw near unto us. He must be able 
and willing to take us by the hand and at the same time 
reach Up with the other and take hold of the eternal throne 
and the everlasting Father, bring heaven and earth together 
and lift man up to God. Now we are to take his place 
among men, possess a measure of his power and do his 
work. But John "was a man" in the best sense of that term. 
How real, how earnest he was ! What a magnificent tribute 
the Savior pays to him! So God wants men of the best 
possible type to serve him — not a mere suggestion of a man ; 
not an apology for the genuine article; not a mere mass 
of flesh and blood and bones whose manhood is a travesty 
on the real thing, but men in the best sense of that term, 
and that includes the sisterhood, also, for the term is used 
generically. Men of strong minds, cultured intellects, clear 
heads, pure hearts, tender affections, noble characters, loving 
ways, winning speech — men of unction, fire and power, 
born of the Holy Ghost. Such men and women as these 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



211 



God sends, if he can find them, into the field for faithful 
service. He sends the very best agents he can get just 
when and where he wants them. When he wanted a father 
for the faithful he sent Abraham out a thousand miles from 
his own country and people to be the founder of a new 
nation. At just the right time he sent just the right man, 
Moses, to lead his children to liberty, life and light. Prior 
to Christ's advent he sent John to herald his coming; and 
"when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his 
Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them 
that were under the law, that we might receive the adop- 
tion of sons." When he wanted an apostle to the Gentiles 
he sent Paul to preach Christ according to his eternal pur- 
pose. When he wanted a herald, of a newer dispensation 
and an apostle to the whole world, he sent Luther to give 
birth to the great reformation which was to shake the 
Roman hierarchy to its foundations. When he wanted a 
man to reform the reformation and usher in the newest 
dispensation, he sent another John, the Wesley, to be the 
father of the greatest revival of modern times. When he 
wants the whole world regenerated he sends modern men 
and women as he sent his successors while standing midway 
between the shame of Calvary's cross and the gloom of 
Joseph's tomb, on the one hand, and the triumph of the 
celestial chariot and the glory of the heavenly shekinah, 
on the other. These all are sent from God to do a holy 
work, and they must do it. Christ was sent, but in a special 
sense he came of his own will. These men and women of 
God all come, but in a special sense they are sent. That is 
the difference. Their commission is as old as Christ's and 
is based upon it. It dates away back in the eternities. 
Hear the Master say: "As the Father hath sent me, even 
so send I you." Think of the eternal reach of that thought. 
"All power is mine ; it shall be yours in such measure as ye 
can employ it, go therefore, preach, teach, baptize, save;. 



212 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



wherever sin has placed its blighting hand; wherever there 
are human sorrows to be relieved, human griefs to be 
assuaged, stricken souls and bleeding hearts to be bound 
up, go, and lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of 
the world." No one has a right to go who is not thus 
sent, for there is a divine call to the ministry, but all so called 
dare not refuse if they value their own peace and salvation, 
while every one of us in both pulpit and pew must either 
go or send if we would be saved in any large sense ourselves. 
The Master lays upon us as upon them this ^reat burden. 
The commission is ours. We are in the succession. He 
says : "Go." Let us all reply, "We come to do thy will, 
O God." 

John was sent for a purpose. He did not come on a 
bootless errand. He was a man with a mission. That 
mission was "to bear witness of that light." The modern 
preacher or layman, like John, "is not that light, but is 
sent to bear witness of that light." In relation to us all, 
the true light is the eternal Logos "which lighteth every 
man that cometh into the world." The light of some min- 
isters is nothing but twilight, and a weak sort of twilight 
at that. They introduce just enough of the shadows of 
doubt and darkness into their teachings to surround every- 
thing they discuss with a sort of nebulous haze. They 
testify of the twilight of Christianity. Others even bear 
witness of the darkness. They have allowed the gospel 
to be supplanted by transcendentalism and all the other 
"isms" of the day till the light has all faded away and the 
gospel is robbed of all its power. The world can never 
be saved in that way. Darkness can never disperse dark- 
ness. The light of our witnessing should be as clear and 
powerful as a sunbeam, penetrating into the darkest nooks 
and corners of the earth, causing the skulking shadows 
to retreat and hide their faces in shame that they had ever 
dared to show them. Foolish was the man who bored a 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



213 



hole in the' side of his windowless house "to let the dark 
out," as he said. Of course his real purpose was to let in 
the light. We need not answer the darkness. We haven't 
time for that. Our business is "to bear witness of the 
light." It will make itself seen and felt, it will tell its own 
story, it will exercise its own power, it will^lo its own work. 
When the king of day rides the heavens in his chariot of 
fire across the pathless sky, he does not ask the privilege 
of shining; he does not apologize for shining; he just shines 
on in all his majesty and shines all the lesser lights into 
obscurity. And so the Christian pulpit and pew will not 
become what they ought to be till they go straight for- 
ward in their great evangelistic and missionary purpose 
of telling the whole world that there is a light above the 
brightness of the noonday sun that will outshine all the 
other luminaries of earth and heaven. 

The object of this testimony is that the world, through 
the witnesser, may believe. The mariner does not need 
to be told when he sees the light flashing from the distant 
shore, that there is a light-house- there. And he is not 
so foolish as to deny the light. He sees it, and knows that 
the light, and the tempest-proof house, and the faithful 
keeper are all there. "Seeing is believing." So today as 
God's people "bear witness of the light," all men through 
them are beginning to believe. They cannot help it. They 
may refuse to come to the light and be saved by it, but 
if they are honest they must believe. The gospel carries 
on its own face and in its wonderful results the undeni- 
able evidences of its superhuman origin and divine power. 
Even pagans say, "We know this is a system come from 
God, for no religion could do the miracles which this one 
does except God be with it." We show them the solid 
foundation on which the whole system rests. No castle 
of feudal days, no cathedral hoary with antiquity, not even 
Eddystone lighthouse itself can begin to present as a founda- 



214 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



tion such solid masonry as that which underlies the whole 
gospel structure. Then we call attention to the glorious 
superstructure towering above it. We say to them, "Walk 
about Zion, and go round about her ; tell the towers thereof. 
Mark ye well her bulwarks, consider her palaces ; that ye 
may tell it to the generation following." Next we flash 
upon them the light of heaven, and as with the journeyman 
on his road to Damascus the light is so brilliant that it 
dazzles and blinds rather than illuminates. Then the scales 
through the ministry of some modern Ananias are pulled 
from their eyes and they see. O, beatific vision ! A 
Swiss girl was watching her father's flock on the mountain- 
side during a total eclipse of the sun. She was. in dark- 
ness and fear, and the moment the period of totality was 
reached she began to cry as though her heart would break. 
Presently the sun shot his darts of fire and threw his pen- 
cils of light over the scene, and the now delighted girl 
clapped her hands in glee and exclaimed, "O, beautiful 
sun." So the modern doubter on beholding the light often 
springs to the grandest confession ever made by human 
lips, and exclaims with Thomas, "My Lord and my God." 
Even the saved savage rejoices in his new-found happiness, 
claps his hands in rapture and exclaims, "O, beautiful Sun 
of Righteousness, light of life, thou hast shined my dark- 
ness all away." These in turn "bear witness of the light," 
and men seeing its good effects on all embrace it at once. 
It is said that a Japanese commissioner at our world's fair 
visited the Bible stand where the book was on sale in 
several hundred languages and dialects. He bought a copy 
printed in Chinese, read it, and was charmed with it. On 
his way home through Europe he made observations on the 
Roman, Grecian and Protestant civilizations. He saw the 
superiority of the latter over all the others, and immediate- 
ly after reaching home he applied for baptism at the hands 
of one of our missionaries. He at once purchased and 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



215 



fitted up at his own expense a heathen temple as a church 
. of Jesus Christ> and here he and others reached and saved 
i in this way by the grace and power of the Christ have ever 
since, met for praise and prayer and work and worship in 
the service of the Master. Thus the work goes on, becom- 
ing more and more reproductive all the time. Only give the 
light a chance and it will shine its way into all lands and 
hearts. 

This saving faith in Christ and his gospel is the only hope 
of our ruined race. All men are lost without it. It may 
not mean so much for the heathen to be lost as it means 
for us who have received and abused the light, but who is 
willing to assume all it does mean? The testimony not 
only of missionaries but of those who have lived among the 
heathen for secular ends is that "they are besotted to the 
last degree ; they do not live up to the light they have ; they 
grovel in lust and sensual indulgence." Their only hope 
is the light of the Logos, and the only help of any of us 
must come from him. Think of our own indebtedness 
to the gospel. But for that America would be a barbarian 
wilderness today, no salvation, no peaceful homes, no free 
institutions, no Christian civilization, no commerce with 
other lands, no anything worth the having. Indeed Eng- 
land and the old world from which we sprang could not 
have been redeemed. It is even doubtful whether America 
would have been discovered when it was if at all. Chris- 
tianity itself would hardly have found its way from the 
land of its birth to all the other nations sitting in darkness. 
It was its far-reaching spirit that first led it from Judaeism 
to Gentileism and on and on till it lifted up its victorious 
voice and shout in old Rome, and finally found its way to 
the shores of this Western world. It has brought with it 
all that is highest and best in our Christian " civilization. 
The Magna Charta of English liberties and the Constitu- 
tion of the United States, though they do not seem to have 



216 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



much gospel in them, are full of it. Wherever men get 
a conception of something nobler in the way of truth, of 
something more elevating and more praiseworthy, that is 
not a rival of the gospel, but is part and parcel of it. The 
march of the sciences, the remarkable progress of the past 
along a thousand lines, the recognition of the rights of man, 
the growth of liberty, national and individual, and the great 
work of personal, social and civil advancement are all born 
of the gospel. I wonder what John, the pioneer preacher, 
thinks as he looks down upon the situation today. He must 
rejoice that he lost his head in so good a cause. Wonder- 
ful has been our advance in the nineteenth century so big 
with events. He who has not kept up with the procession 
has been compelled to lag behind. We have made progress 
and history by. long strides and mighty bounds. Relics 
of barbarism and effete systems of civilization have been 
rapidly relegated to the rear. The whiz of the millions 
of whirling wheels started in motion within that time pro- 
duces an astounding hum of industry. The facilities for 
travel and traffic on land and sea, and the vastly increasing 
speed are almost incredible. Now we are only five days 
away from Europe, and we fly along in our railway palaces 
hard after our fiery, panting, snorting monsters that dart 
like horizontal thunderbolts at the rate of a mile a minute. 
The speed of these steeds of steel is of so fearful a velocity 
that we can see only a few objects along the track of the 
bounding behemoth and they are all going the other way. 
Scarcely less wonderful are our leaping leviathans of the 
the deep born and developed within that time. Space is 
almost annihilated and travel reduced to a luxury. Indeed, 
up-to-date machinery of all sorts now does the work of 
many millions of men. Even the farmer can now go buggy 
riding and plow his corn, or reap down his grain, thresh 
it out and sack it up ready for market, all at the same time. 
The laws of sound had been saying for centuries, "Give 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION, 



217 



us lines along which we can operate and we will show 
you what we can do." Only a few years ago, Edison by 
his witchery coaxed this invisible power to leap 1,500 miles 
at a single bound over his slender highway , of wire, and 
charmed his phonograph and graphophone into faithfully 
recording the faintest and loudest notes of singer or orator, 
and accurately reproducing them, even years after the tongue 
of the one and the lips of the other are turned to dust. 

Applied electricity in its multiplied forms and limitless 
possibilities is a recent gift. Without this the magic and 
charming white city by the lake in 1893 at our own and 
only Chicago would have been impossible. This subtle 
fluid is now demanding only favorable environment and 
proper conditions to show us more marvelous things than 
man ever imagined. Who can even dream of its unthink- 
able future? Colossal are the events and innumerable and 
invaluable are the inventions of the last century. 

No less remarkable has been our advance along other 
lines of a true Christian civilization. The recent ethical 
and ethnical triumphs of Christianity are simply stupend- 
ous. Larger sympathy for the weak, more humanity for 
man, especially in war, and greater magnanimity in dealing 
with a conquered foe have characterized that period as they 
have no other in all history. Who ever before heard of a 
victorious nation that sent its enemy's captured army home 
across the sea at its own expense, as the United States 
did at the close of our war with Spain? The Hague peace 
conference was the closing and crowning climax of this 
greatest of all centuries, and presages the time when all 
national difficulties will be settled by arbitration. The Uni- 
ted States is now a great world-power, and all this insures 
the practical alliance of all the great powers that make for 
Christ's final and eternal triumph. 

I know that some taunt us with the fact that nineteen 
centuries of Christianity have not saved the world, and 



218 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



they argue therefrom a want of divinity in the system. 
Let us see : If geology has taught us anything of value it 
is that the world was long ages in preparation before it 
was habitable by man. Does anybody plead an absence 
of power in the Creator because of that fact? So we read, 
"The Creator of the ends of the earth fainteth not, neither 
is weary." Ah, the Almighty is never in a hurry. All 
time, all eternity are his in which to accomplish his eternal 
purposes. "One day with him is as a thousand years, and 
a thousand years as one day." But he has no doubt about 
the outcome. He sees the end from the beginning. "This 
man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, 
sat down on the right hand of God ; from henceforth ex- 
pecting till his enemies be made his footstool." Not a 
muscle of his face moves. O, the sublimity of that imperial 
quiet ! 

The triumphs of the nineteenth century have paved the 
way magnificently for the greater conquests of the twen- 
tieth. Through the operation of all its agents, agencies 
and forces, along with other and perhaps mightier uplifting 
powers that are to come in regular succession hereafter, 
the millennium is to find its glowing introduction and 
its glorious consummation. According to a true Christian 
optimism the world is to grow better and humanity is to 
be lifted higher till time shall be no more. The dove of 
peace shall out-fly the war-eagle in God's own good time, 
and hover over all the earth. Upon all lands the gospel 
sunlight is streaming, and everywhere the darkness is re- 
ceding. All forces are combining to place the rightful 
King upon the world's throne. The lines of prophecy and 
history are all converging at a common focus and throw 
a flood of heavenly glory over the situation. The Almighty 
is shaking the nations preparatory to giving them to his 
Son. War is only the means to the end, which is a universal 
and lasting peace. Power after power goes down as Christ 



THE MAN AND HIS MISSION. 



219 



ascends the throne. The heathen are being given the Lord 
for his "inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth 
for his possession." The morning cometh. Soon may be 
heard the shout of victory, sounding through all heaven 
from center to circumference and ringing over all the earth, 
"as the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many 
waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, 
"Alleluia, for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth !" 
Amen and Amen ! 



THE IDENTIFICATION OF THE PERFECT MAN 
WITH THE CHRIST. 



(Baccalaureate Sermon, 1900.) 

BY REV. E. M. SMITH, D. D., 

President of Illinois Wesley an University. 

"Till we all come * * * unto a perfect man; unto the meas- 
ure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." — Ephesians, 4 : 13. 

It is an impressive fact that we are alive and are here on 
this beautiful morning of June 10, 1900. It is a wonderful 
thing to feel the pulse beat and the chest rise and fall, to be 
conscious of the various processes of physical and mental 
life, and to realize, that, in another moment, the gate may be 
shut, and all these complicated and wonderful processes 
cease. The express train of time is now here, but it makes 
no stop at this or any other station. Soon tfre rumbling of 
its wheels will be heard in the distance, and naught remain 
but a thin line of vanishing smoke to tell of its passing. 
Life is but a passing "now," until, with one last "now," 
"like a clap of thunder comes the judgment." 

It is not strange that the questions have often been 
asked : Whence came we ? What are we ? Whither are we 
bound? Because they have been so often asked and still 
remain unanswered, they are questions of perennial in- 
terest. 

As relating to the body, they are easily answered. Its 
history is from dust to dust. It came from the dust, is 
dust, and to dust returns. The only question remaining is 
whether the method was special creation, as we used to 

220 



PERFECT MAN WITH TH£ CHRIST. 221 



think, or evolution from the lower animals, as we are now 
taught. This question is interesting, but not vital. 

The origin of the human soul is shrouded in mystery. 
There are those who hold, with Plato, the doctrine of its pre- 
existence. They teach that — 

''Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting. 
The soul that rises with us, our life-star, 
Hath had elsewhere its setting, 
And cometh from afar. 
Not in entire forgetfulness, 
And not in utter nakedness, 
But trailing clouds of glory do we come 
From God, who is our home." 

According to this view, we bring from that other state 
certain ideas, slumbering in the mysterious depths of sub- 
consciousness, to be here awakened to new activity and per- 
haps dimly recognized as friends of former days. There are 
others who believe that each new soul is a special creation ; 
that into each newly created body — created of God, though 
begotten of man — God, at some point, breathes a divine 
spark, a living soul. Still others would have us believe 
that the history of the body is a type of the history of the 
squI ; that the latter, like the former, is a product of evolu- 
tion from the lower types of life. Here, again, the question 
must resolve itself into one of method. The important fact 
is that man is from God; that he is mind, not matter. He 
thinks, feels, wills ; matter does neither. Or if there be any 
underlying unity in which the differences between mind 
and matter are reconciled, the contradictions sublated, that 
unity must be mind. Of mind we are sure. Of mind 
nothing can rob us. It is revealed in consciousness, it is 
the fundamental reality. 

Having briefly stated this basal position, we are ready to 
consider the doctrine of the text, that the perfect man is the 
Christ, and that the perfection of manhood is the attainment 
of the "measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." 



222 



THE IDENTIFICATION OF THE 



Man's physical life begins in a struggle with environment, 
a contention for the right to be. In this struggle to gain 
a foothold and maintain it against environment, myriads 
of infants perish. Nature's prodigality in the production 
of living germs and her seeming heartlessness in their aban- 
donment is one of her greatest mysteries ; and in her treat- 
ment of man she makes no exception to her rule. He must 
first gain a standing against environment, then maintain 
his hold, make headway, explore, conquer and subdue, 
appropriate environment to his uses, and build himself up 
out of it; only to find that at last it gains upon him, pulls 
him down into his grave, and resolves him into a million 
elements. Just so the Christ child found environment 
against him; no room in the inn, must flee for his life into 
Egypt, had not where to lay his head, and at last the cross 
and the tomb. What means this victory of environment? 
What means physical death ? It means that physical evolu- 
tion has reached its climax, and that intellectual and moral 
evolution has begun. Defeat is the beginning of victory; 
death, the prelude- of life. 

Similarly, 'the infant soul must make its way. It must 
first grope its way blindly toward self-consciousness; then 
affirm itself as distinct from the body and from outward 
objects ; and, as the result of that conflict and struggle which 
Fichte so impressively describes, gain the mastery over en- 
vironment and subdue it to its own uses. Gravity, lightning 
are no longer feared, but utilized. Nature is no more a 
tyrant, but a servant, and mind is lord. The infant soul is 
also born into an environment of customs and traditions 
and legal enactments which, like his swadling clothes, partly 
help and partly hinder him, partly protect and partly 
oppress him. They secure to him, imperfectly, certain 
rights ; but they send him, into the army, the navy, to> the 
jail, to the prison, the gallows. Worst of all they act as 
restraints upon his intellectual freedom. They are neces- 



PERFECT MAN WITH THE CHRIST. 223 



sary to his progress, but he must rise above these crude 
helps, on his way to rational manhood. He must acquire 
the liberty to think, as well as to act, for himself. 

But there is yet another struggle, in some respects the 
most severe of all, the struggle with the "moral law within," 
that law which Kant has so impressively compared, in its 
infinitude and beauty, to the "starry heavens above." There 
are no more dramatic or pathetic scenes in history than those 
which describe the struggles of earnest, sensitive, conscien- 
tious souls with this moral law within. What self-examina- 
tions ! What probing of motives! What borings-through 
of the inmost self! What self-humiliation! What ex- 
quisite moral pain! Witness the great soul of Jonathan 
Edwards, in the presence of that diary of countless minutes 
and most searching rules, testing himself daily to the quick, 
to see whether he had kept them ; — such rules as this : 
"Resolved, never to do a thing of the rightfulness of which 
I am so much in doubt that I intend to consider it after- 
wards, unless I am equally in doubt as to< the rightfulness 
of leaving it undone." History is full of such instances. 
They are the struggle of St. Paul in the seventh of Romans : 
"Oh, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from 
the body of this death?" 

Man must rise above the moral law, as well as the physi- 
ical, in order to be a perfect man. He must rise into a region 
which is above law — a state of liberty, of rational self-reali- 
zation. 

Having traced man through these several stages toward 
perfection, do we understand him at last ? Can we grasp him 
and define him, or do we see him vanishing from us in up- 
ward flight ? This, at least, we see, that this perfect man is 
none other than the Christ of God. This rational liberty is 
Christian liberty, the liberty exalted of St. Paul. It is 
escape from law, not by violating it, but by fulfilling it. The 
law has been a schoolmaster to bring us to liberty, to Christ. 



224 THE IDENTIFICATION OF THE 



We have rationalized our religious conception ; and to ra- 
tionalize religion is not to lose it, but to understand it. 

And now, having identified the perfect man with the 
Christ, before proceeding to unfold the meaning of this 
identification, let us make a single statement, in the interest 
of clearness. By a perfect man is not meant a finished up 
man. Man is never completed, never reaches a stopping 
place ; but is ever moving on, ever becoming. If the idea of 
perfection were completedness, then the only perfect man 
must be a fossil, or an Egyptian mummy, or a statue of a 
man chiseled out by the artist. We should soon understand 
him, be done with him, and cry, Away with him! But 
the perfect man is a living man, not a manufactured product, 
and because living, ever changing, and because changing, 
interesting. Life is adjustment to environment, and the 
perfect man must be perfectly adjusted to his environment. 
As that changes he must change; as it enlarges, he must 
expand ; as it rises, he must advance ; if it falls, he must raise 
it up again. As it acts upon him, he must respond, or fall 
out and give place to another. But he can act, as well as 
be acted upon. That man can change his environment, we 
have only to look out upon our lawns and cornfields to be 
convinced. The perfect man, then, must be constantly 
changing, perfectly responsive, not mechanical, but elastic, 
and progressive. He must have all the infinite adjustable- 
ness of life. That the perfect man is, in this respect, identi- 
cal with the Christ, needs not to be proven. 

The perfect man is the Christ-man — "the measure of the 
stature of the fulness of Christ." He is thus a mediator, 
an atonement between God and man. A man who is not 
divine, who has only brute powers, is not a man. It is the 
spark of divinity that makes the man. The true man has an 
ethical and spiritual nature. He is capable of that divinest 
of all attributes, love, and the God who is not human, who is 
not open to our needs, is one-sided, and can be little more 



PERFECT MAN WITH THE CHRIST. 



225 



than an abstraction. The two natures, the human and the 
divine, overlap. Each is in part the other. The. perfect man 
is divine; the perfect God, human. 

" "lis the weakness in strength that I cry for ! my flesh that I seek 
In the Godhead! I seek and I find it, Oh Saul, it shall be 
A Face like my face that receives thee; a Man like to me 
Thou shalt love, and be loved by, forever; a Hand like this hand 
Shall throw open the gates of new life to thee ! See the Christ stand !" 

And this perfect man, the Christ, is not only a mediator 
between God and man, but also between man and man, a 
mediator of truth. He will be ahead of most men, but 
behind a few. He must advance ever along the lines of 
truth, and move as truth moves. In politics, the rational 
man, the true independent, is not liked by the leaders of any 
party. He is too fast for the conservatives and they cry out 
in alarm : "Hold ! hold !" He is too slow for the fanatics, 
and they cry impatiently : "Come on ! come on ! for shame !" 
Thus he is ground between the upper and the lower mill- 
stones. In religion he does not suit the orthodox, and they 
call him a heretic ; nor the free-thinkers, and they call him 
a bigot. And so, like his Master, he is crucified between 
thieves. Too orthodox for the Sadducees and not orthodox 
enough for the Pharisees ; offending the Romans by refusing 
to worship Caesar, and the Jews by paying him the tribute 
money, by the union of all the offended forces the Christ 
is crucified. And is that the end of Him? Nay! nay! at 
His death He just begins to live. Freed from all limitations 
and restraints, He enters henceforth into the thought and 
life of the race. This age needs the fearless, industrious 
thinker, intent on the discovery of truth. He may be 
despised and rejected, persecuted and put to death ; but let 
him not be troubled. He will not be vanquished. John 
Brown's body lies mouldering in the grave; but his soul is 
marching on. The assassin's bullet pierced the brain of 
Abraham Lincoln; but the emancipation proclamation still 



226 



THE IDENTIFICATION OF THE 



lives. The Christ was crucified ; but he is crowned Lord of 
all forevermore. 

And what is the relation of the perfect man, the Christ, 
to society? The old pagans represented Atlas as under the 
earth, bearing it upon his shoulders. There is a truth in 
this view. Not only the "white man's burden," but the 
burden of the race, is on the shoulders of every true man. 
Underneath are the "everlasting arms." Art has sometimes 
represented the deity as an all-seeing eye, piercing to the 
core of everything; and, sometimes, as an awful, yet benig- 
nant, face, looking out from the darkness ; or a voice coming 
forth from the clouds of Sinai. One old painting represents 
the deity as a hand reaching down to the earth, and man 
is rising out from the dust responsive to its beck. In each 
of these conceptions there is truth. God in Christ embraces 
them all, and much more. When Hector, the Trojan hero, 
before the last dire conflict in which he cruelly falls, returns 
to his loved Troy for a sad and ominous leave-taking of 
his wife and child, who have come to the walls to meet 
him, the warrior, accoutered as he is, with helmet and 
plume, stretches out his arms to receive his child; but the 
boy, frightened by the waving plume, shrinks from him 
and clings to his nurse's bosom. Then Hector steps back, 
removes the helmet and again turns to his boy. And now 
the child recognizes his father's face and comes delighted 
to his arms. God in Christ has taken off his helmet that we 
may recognize our father. "He that hath seen Me hath 
seen the Father." Christ is the translation of the infinite 
attributes of God into the language of the finite. In Him 
we see what those attributes mean in human conduct and 
character ; and in the perfect man, even as in the Christ, they 
are incarnated. 

But not merely under humanity, as Atlas under the earth ; 
nor approaching it from above, as in so many works of art ; 
nor yet unhelmeted, at the side of man, as in His earth life, 



PERFECT MAN WITH THE CHRIST. 227 



is the perfection of the Christ. He is all these; but He is 
more. He has entered into man, into society, into human 
thought and feeling. "It is expedient for you that I go 
away; for if I go not away the Comforter will not come; 
but if I go away I will send Him unto you, that he may 
abide with you forever." And so, the Christ has passed 
into humanity. Each of us here today is as conscious of 
his neighbor as of himself, and as conscious of the Christ 
as of either. We live in Him and He in us. The perfect 
man, with the Christ, must enter into society, by sympathy 
and affection and co-operation, into its joys, its sorrows, 
its burdens, its cares. He must be a part of our common 
humanity, and that humanity must be a part of his inmost 
consciousness. 

But the crowning glory of the Christ is His abiding con- 
sciousness that He is the Son of God ; and the perfect man 
dwelleth with Him on the lofty height of that sonship. 
There is a wide difference between a stranger, or a servant, 
in the house and a son. With the son there is a sympathy, 
a sense of proprietorship, felt by no other. He feels : This 
is my father's, my mother's house, and, therefore, in a 
peculiar way, it belongs to me. Its furnishings, its arrange- 
ment, the ornaments on its walls, have more than money 
value. They speak of father, mother, brother, sister — in a 
word, of home. If we are sons of God, we feel that way 
about the universe. It is our father's house, and we are at 
home in it. The fields, the woods, the streams, the skies, 
are ours and are His gift. As He is infinite, His universe 
is boundless. We can never get to the end of it. The treas- 
ures are inexhaustible. We can never find them out, we can 
never understand them. Mysteries too deep for us are on 
every side ; but the "secret of the Lord is with them that fear 
Him." Love is the key to all mysteries. The son may not 
be able to reason out the ways of the father ; but he has an 
intuitive insight into his heart, and he knows that heart is 



THE IDENTIFICATION OF THE 



love. The mystery of existence, which Jacob wrestled all 
night to solve, is clear to the instincts of the son. 

" "Pis love, 'tis love, thou died'st for me. 
I hear Thy whisper in my heart. 
The morning breaks, the shadows flee, 
Pure, universal love Thou art." 

But no man knoweth the Father but the Son. He alone 
is at home in the universe and is not "troubled" nor "afraid." 

Friends of the graduating classes, it is for us to work 
out the problem of perfection. It is for us to be alert and to 
adjust ourselves as wisely as possible to our constantly 
changing environment. Commencement will soon be gone ! 
We shall move on and the world will move on; and we 
must change, because the world is changing. Pardon one or 
two practical remarks : 

There is a great deal of narrowness and pettiness and 
meanness in the world. It is the mission of educated men 
and women to be above them. True greatness is your 
calling. 

You have here been brought into contact with truth, and 
truth is always dangerous. Truth takes us into unexplored 
regions. She goes before us, and we must follow. Some- 
times she lets us come up with her, and we get a pretty good 
view; and then she disappears in the distance, and we are 
in danger of losing our way. But it is better to live in the 
constant peril inseparable from this pursuit of truth, than to 
give ourselves over to certain death. And so we say to you : 
Dare to seek the truth; for she alone can lift you above the 
age and enable you to serve it. 

Religious dogmas need to be rationalized. That is, they 
need to be stated in the language and light of today and 
thus understood. We need to get the kernel out of the shell, 
and to save the kernel while we throw away the shell. This 
process is rapidly going forward. Do not misunderstand it. 
It is dangerous, but it is necessary, and need not be destruc- 
tive. 



PERFECT MAN WITH THE CHRIST. 229 

In the same way religion must be rationalized in the 
direction of conduct. This is a process equally needed and 
equally dangerous. Moral distinctions are badly mixed. We 
strain at gnats and swallow camels. Things destitute of 
moral quality are represented as essential to salvation, while 
righteousness is" slighted or lost, to sight. It is for educated 
men and women to establish the true perspective. The 
guiding principles are to be found by a right understanding 
of the Christ. The spirit of sonship in Him will not let us 
go far astray ; for, if we are good sons, we shall also be 
good brothers. Carry, I pray you, into the world this prin- 
ciple of the rational interpretation of all truth. 

With these words I send you forth with my Godspeed. 
Carry the spirit of the Christ into all things ; for this is 
religion, this is perfection. By strong sympathy enter into 
the life of the age. Be a conscious and helpful part of the 
social organism. We cannot penetrate the veil of the future. 
We - do not know all that is in man. We remember that, 
while the risen Christ was speaking to His disciples and His 
hands were outspread in blessing, He rose from the earth 
and a cloud received Him out of their sight, and the voices 
jof the angels came to the gazing and astonished disciples 
in reassuring words. So, as we try to understand the per- 
fect man, the ideal rises above our vision and disappears 
in upward splendor; but its full realization awaits us above 
the clouds. 



THE PRINCIPLE OF THE CROSS. 



BY REV. J. W. MILLER, A. M., 

Pastor at Urbana. 

"For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth 
in pain together until now. And not only they, but ourselves also, 
which have the first fruits of the spirit, even we ourselves groan 
within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of 
our body." — Rom. 8 '.22-23. 

The eighth chapter of Romans is the most remarkable pas- 
sage that has come from the pen of that Hebrew of the 
Hebrews. It is Paul's "Moral Philosophy of the Universe." 
Every great principle of God's government is mentioned in 
that chapter. Like the Mississippi it drains a continent. 

Running through this remarkable chapter is a continuous 
teaching. Just as in the cordage of a British man-of-war 
runs the crimson thread that designates it as belonging to the 
Royal Navy, so the teaching of suffering runs through this 
eighth chapter, emphasizing the principle of the cross. 

The great law of the world's progress is sacrifice. From 
the beginning we can trace this method. Who can fathom 
its philosophy? Yet it is God's method. This law is illus- 
trated everywhere in nature. The world with its fertile 
fields and plains, its forests and mines, would not have been 
here but for this method. The earth was first created as 
a fire mist ; swirling in space ; concentrating and contracting ; 
assuming the spherical; a liquid, then a solid; but as yet a 
great cinder. Atmospheric changes, heat and moisture made 
it possible for life to .exist. Then appeared crude forms of 
life, that lived and died and prepared the way for more 

mo 



THE PRINCIPLE OF THE CROSS. 



231 



and better life. The great forests of that age lived only 
to die and make soil and fuel for the present age. 

The animal lived, subject to the influences of environment, 
to die that higher forms of life might appear. 

Glaciers went grinding down between the mountains, 
tearing away- their sides, rounding off* the hill-tops, God's 
great harrow preparing the landscape. Sacrifice is the meth- 
od of nature. The astronomer tells us that the sun ripens 
the harvests by burning itself up. Each golden sheaf, each 
orange bough, each cluster of grapes costs the sun tons of 
carbon. The sun expends force enough in ripening a straw- 
berry, in painting it crimson, in refining the sugar and 
mixing the flavors, to run a train from Philadelphia to New 
York. 

The traveler standing on the eastern slope of the Alps, 
looking down upon the fertile plains of Italy, all gilded with 
corn and fragrant grass, wreathed with violets and butter- 
cups that wave in the summer wind, often forgets that the 
beauty of the plain was bought at the price of the barrenness 
of the mountains. 

When we turn to the realm of human life we still find 
that the law of progress is sacrifice. The highways of human 
progress are lit up by the fires of martyrdom. The blazing 
fagots light up the gloom of the past, reveal dying men, 
nations in battle suffering and struggling. Their flickering 
glare reveals 'the outline of a cross with its suffering Savior 
and the shadow falls across human history. 

The world has been thinking that the meaning of the 
cross is that Christ came to save the world by one supreme, 
divine instance of suffering, and that now the saved world 
would sweep onward in harmony and happiness. True, one 
meaning of the cross is peace and harmony, but there is 
another meaning that some have forgotten or overlooked. 
It is that it reveals the method of the world's salvation, not 
only in the hour of Calvary's bloody tragedy, but throughout 



232 



THE PRINCIPLE OF THE CROSS. 



all ages. The early church soon realized this law. The 
first to follow his Lord is Stephen, then James. One after 
another falls, not one is left out. 

"Wherever there is a John the Baptist there is a Herod's 
sword. Wherever a Savanarola arises to herald the breaking 
light of a new day of God, somewhere in the, lurking shad- 
ows the jealous demons of the night are gathering fagots for 
a new martyrdom." 

Three great persecutions are recorded in the early cen- 
turies of the Christian era in which hundreds of thousands 
perished. We of today scarcely realize the cost in suffering 
of the propagation of the faith in the world. It is claimed 
by historians that Nero set fire to Rome and blamed the 
destruction of the imperial city upon the Christians. He 
rebuilt the Coliseum on a grander scale than ever. Timbers 
were brought from the slopes of Atlas, the greatest archi- 
tects put forth their skill to construct an ampitheater surpass- 
ing all others, fitted for such a crowd as none before had 
been able to accommodate. In this coliseum Nero determined 
to destroy the Christians to satisfy his own thirst for blood 
and the hate of the Romans. Christians had been gathered 
from all parts of the empire and placed in dungeons, of 
which Rome had many. The day of the destruction came. 
From daylight throngs of the populace waited the opening 
of the gates, listening with delight to the roars of lions, 
the hoarse growls of panthers, and the howls of wild dogs. 
The beasts had not been fed for two days, but pieces of 
bloody flesh had been thrust before them, to arouse their 
hunger and rage. At times such a storm of wild cries came 
from the dens that caused many to grow pale with fear. 
At sunrise, inside the circus the sound of hymns could be 
heard in clear, calm tones. The crowd listened with aston- 
ishment. "The Christians ! the Christians !" they exclaimed. 
Many detachments of Christians had been brought from the 
various prisons that night into the circus. Hundreds of 



the; principle of the cross. 



233 



voices of men, women and children were heard singing the 
morning hymns. 

At last the corridors leading to the interior of the build- 
ing, called the vomitoria, were opened and the crowd rushed 
in. But the number was so great that they flowed in for 
hours, until it was a marvel that the circus would hold 
such a multitude. The roar of the beasts smelling the exha- 
lations of the multitude grew louder. While taking their 
places the spectators made an uproar like the waves of the 
sea in time of storm. Soon the dignitaries and attendants 
began to arrive, greeted with shouts from the multitude. 
Later came the priests and after them the sacred Virgins of 
Vesta were brought in, preceded by lictors. Then came 
Nero in company with Augusta. 

The sight was indeed magnificent. The lower seats 
crowded with togas, were white as snow. In the gilded 
podium sat Nero, wearing a diamond collar and the golden 
crown upon his head. By his side the beautiful and gloomy 
Augusta. On both sides were Vestal Virgins, senators with 
purple togas, officers of the army with glittering weapons. 
In a word, all that was powerful, brilliant or rich in *Rome 
was there. In farther rows sat knights, and higher up in 
darkened rows a sea of common heads, above which from 
pillar to pillar hung festoons of roses, lilies and ivy. 

The impatience of the waiting multitude was manifest by 
stamping, which became like the sound of unbroken thunder. 
Then the prefect of the city rode around the arena and gave 
a signal with a handkerchief, answered by the exclamations 
of the people and they became quiet. 

The spectacle opened with combats between northern and 
southern barbarians, fighting blindfolded. After the first 
interval came the turn of the Christians. This was something 
new. All waited with curiosity to see how the Christians 
would bear themselves. The multitude were unfriendly. 
Those people were to appear who had burned Rome with all 



234 



THE PRINCIPLE OF THE CROSS. 



its ancient treasures. Death and terror seemed hovering in 
the air. The multitude, usually gladsome, became silent and 
moody under the influence of hate. An old man appeared 
and walked slowly across the arena and struck three times 
upon the door. Throughout the whole ampitheater rolled 
the deep murmur, "The Christians ! the Christians !" Hun- 
dreds of men, women and children were driven in. They 
assembled near the center and sang a hymn, then one of 
their number offered prayer. The multitude looked in silent 
awe. While yet praying the wild dogs from the Pyrenees 
were turned in upon them and the awful spectacle of cruel 
destruction began. 

Then the lions were loosed, then beasts of all kinds, 
tigers from the Euphrates, Numidian panthers, hyenas, bears, 
wolves, jackals. There was a chaos of woe surpassing all 
description. It lost the appearance of reality, it became a 
dreadful dream, a blood orgy. The people became terrified, 
the spasmodic laughter of women, whose strength had given 
way at the sight, was heard. Faces grew dark. Voices 
began to cry, "Enough ! Enough !" But amid the applause, 
the uproar, the terror of the people, could be heard the hymns 
of the dying Christians and the words, "Pro Christo, pro 
Christo." 

Nero that day destroyed hundreds of Christians, but for 
every one that perished, two were awakened in the multi- 
tude. As that multitude swept out, hundreds were sobbing, 
men were pale with conviction. The invisible Spirit was at 
work within. In vain Nero lit up his gardens at night with 
living torches, Christianity grew and spread. 

Today the Christian religion is powerful in the earth. The 
Christian way is pleasant. Men are apt to forget the method 
of its progress. 

It is to be hoped that the Christian world has not for- 
gotten this lesson. What has made the world interested 
in Africa? Has it not been the suffering of such men as 



THK PRINCIPLE OF THE CROSS. 



235 



Livingston, Stanley and Taylor? England is interested in 
Africa. Ah, yes ! we say to the extent of those gold mines 
and diamond fields. But England has other interests in 
Africa. In the midst of the Boer war a significant incident 
occurred. When Livingston died, according to a custom of 
the natives, his heart was removed and buried, then the body 
was brought to England. It is literally true that the -heart 
of Livingston is in Africa which was the burden of his 
last recorded words. While England was sending troops 
and war materials on every vessel with which to conquer 
the Boer there was fitted out an expedition that was to 
carry a beautiful monument and erect it at the spot where the 
heart of Livingston is buried. The method of the cross is at 
work to save Africa. Wait a little and we shall yet see, 
flung upon the breast of the war cloud, the shadow of the 
cross. It is the great key that unlocked America and India, 
and will unlock the door to the heart of the dark continent. 

What did it mean for India when so many heroic lives 
were lost in the Sepoy rebellion, sacrificed for the cause 
of Christ? Since that time missionaries by the hundreds 
and money by the million have poured into India. There has 
been marvelous growth. The cross was the bloody key that 
unlocked India. It seems that the greater the price we pay 
for anything the more valuable it is to us. The more that 
one nation gives to another in suffering and blood, in toil and 
money the greater the interest of that nation in the other. 
The more you and I give of friends or means to heathen 
lands the deeper our interest in those lands. 

All this is illustrated in the brief but beautiful story of 
Charles A. Gray, who went as a teacher to Singapore. Young 
Gray was a student of Ohio Wesleyan University. He was 
a stalwart fellow, of genial presence, tireless energy and 
boundless enthusiasm. After his college days he became 
a teacher in the Fultonham Academy, where his influence 
with the boys was remarkable, How much he made of his 



236 



THE PRINCIPLE OF THE CROSS. 



opportunities only those can tell, who coming from an 
evening spent in his room, a drive behind his favorite 
horse, a tramp with him over the hills, realized that they 
had pledged their lives to the Master in response to Gray's 
earnest pleading. 

Early in life he had found the Savior, and through all 
his young manhood was active in all lines of Christian work. 
The genial current of his life flowed out to every one, no 
matter from what station in life they came. Years went 
by, new fields of labor were entered with increased ardor 
and success. But to those who knew him best some of the 
joy seemed missing from his life. Then it was they learned 
that a voice had come to him from the Master, saying, 
"Go preach." Like Jonah, he had been fleeing from the 
presence of the Lord. All his work in the city's slums and 
missions had not sufficed to lift from his soul the burden 
laid upon it in the call to labor in the foreign field. Yielding 
to his own ambitions, the influence of parents and friends 
and all that makes life in one's native land preferable, the 
decision was for some time delayed. But one glorious au- 
tumn day he came to his friends with the joy of a new-born 
purpose glowing in his face, to say that he was on his way 
to Nineveh at last. Soon after this at the session of the 
Ohio conference arrangements were made for him to go at 
once to Malaysia, as a teacher in the boys' school at Singa- 
pore. Soon he was journeying toward the orient. To the 
friends at home came a few long and sunny letters, full of 
praise and hope and joy, and all too soon the brief announce- 
ment of his death. Dr. Oldham tells us in that beautiful tract 
"Translated from Malaysia," how stalwart young Gray 
died. Within six weeks after he began his work Gray took 
sick. A premonition of death came to him. He called the 
school lads about him and taking each one by the hand 
pleaded with them to give themselves to God. "Boys," he 
cried, "I am not dying; my Father is folding me to his 



THE PRINCIPLE OF THE CROSS. 



237 



bosom !" Then he sang a verse of "Down at the Cross Where 
My Saviour Died." In a few minutes he was gone. The 
boys sobbed and wept while they were amazed at his faith. 

Dr. Oldham narrates a visit with one of the boys to his 
home, where at meal time he told the story of Gray's death. 
The old grandfather, himself a pagan became strangely 
excited, and rising to his feet, seized Dr. Oldham, then 
turning to the assembled guests, exclaimed, "Oh, sirs! did 
you ever hear tell of such a thing ! A man not afraid to 
die! Singing praises to his God and not being overcome 
with fear !" Then turning to Dr. Oldham he said solemnly : 
"Sir, yonder stands my boy. He is the light of these old eyes 
— you have had him two years. When you return to Singa- 
pore take him with you. But whatever else you do, fill him 
up with this religion." 

But the story is not complete, it will never be completed 
till the end of time. God's plan for Gray seemed mysterious, 
but in the light of the years that have come and gone his plan 
and purpose have been revealed. In the homeland, as well as 
in the islands of the sea, his influence is still being felt. 
In his own family two younger brothers have heeded the call 
to the ministry; an uncle was led to Christ and gave his 
fortune to missions, because of that grave in India. 

The world is greatly interested in China. China will be 
saved. We now see missionaries coming home. But soon 
every ship will be carrying missionaries to Hong Kong, Can- 
ton, aye! Pekin. 

The other day I looked upon a picture of a group of 
Christian Chinese. Their noble faces appealed to me and 
touched my heart. They were slain in the "Boxer" rebellion. 
They are the seed corn of a great harvest. How the 
faith of the world has been strengthened in the Christian 
religion by the faith of the native converts in China. That 
religion has lost nothing of its power. No more glorious 



238 



THE PRINCIPLE OF THE CROSS. 



martyrdom is recorded in the history of the Christian Church 
than that of these faithful Chinese. 

Wait a little. Give the "Martyr's blood, the seed of the 
church" time to grow. The wave of sympathy and love 
for China has for the time receded. It will gather again and 
come back like a tidal wave, lifted up by the magnetism of him 
who sits upon the throne, and it will break far inland over 
China. There are graves along the placid waters of the 
Yellow river that call across the shining waves of the Pacific 
to us that we will answer. Every wave whose long sweep 
washes up the golden sands of our western shore brings us a 
message from the land where our fallen brothers lie. 

Thus it has been and thus it will be. Sacrifice is the 
law of progress. We have come through tears. There 
have been many in every age who have been saved by the 
washing of their - garments in blood. A strange white that 
comes from crimson. But so it is. There is sacrifice and 
suffering in all realms but the highest suffering and the 
keenest pain is in connection with the kingdom of God. But 
it is suffering that like the wings of a mighty angel bears 
the soul over the little things of life and brings it near the 
very throne of God. 

After such suffering comes the highest joy. Then comes 
into the soul that sacrifices, loves and endures, and yields 
itself as a martyr to right, a joy and felicity that self-indul- 
gence never dreamed of. 

It is well for us that the vision of life's toil and suffering 
is not given all at once. The deeds of sacrifice to be done, 
the disappointments to be endured, the sorrow of failures to 
be borne, from which the faith of the strongest would turn 
if the visions of dujty and truth were not given one by one 
and the path of toil pointed out step by step. If the brave- 
hearted Cromwell could have known the conditions that 
followed hard after the Puritan revolution, his sturdy sword 
would have fallen from his hand. If the brave men who 



THE PRINCIPE OE THE CROSS. 



289 



fought and suffered for the union in the sixties had seen 
then that a generation after the war, the race problem would 
be the most perilous, the most unsettled problem of American 
statesmanship, that mobs and race wars would fill the land 
with horror and dread, and that the most piteous appeals 
of all history would then be made by the black men of the 
south to the. white men of the north it is a question if the 
revelation would not have turned their faces homeward. 
God's issues are vast and require time. The immediate re- 
sults of our sacrifice are not always satisfactory. But he will 
eventually reward our hopes with more glorious achieve- 
ments than we dreamed. 

In one of the marches of Constantine he is reported to 
have seen with his own eyes the luminous trophy of the 
cross glowing above the meridian sun, and inscribed with 
the words, "By this conquer." 

This amazing object in the sky astonished the whole 
army, as well as the emperor himself, who was at that time 
undetermined in the choice of a religion. His astonishment 
was converted into faith by the vision of the ensuing night. 
Christ appeared before his eyes and displaying the same 
celestial sign of the cross, directed Constantine to frame 
a similar standard and to march with the assurance of victory 
against Maxentius and all his enemies. This symbol sancti- 
fied the arms of the soldiers of Constantine. The cross glit- 
tered on their helmets, was engraved on their shields and 
was interwoven in their banners. The power of this symbol 
was dreaded by the foes of Constantine the sight of which 
in the distress of battle animated his soldiers with an invinc- 
ible enthusiasm and scattered terror and dismay through 
the ranks of the enemy. 

The cross is the great ensign of the Christian army. 

The cross stands as a continuous summons to our faith 
and devotion to be manifest in self-denying lives. It can 
never mean less than the dedication of our entire nature 
and life to God. 



240 



THE PRINCIPLE OF THE CROSS. 



There come times in life when the Cross of Christ is 
instinct with new emphasis — times when it becomes clear to 
us that the old way of living is to be discarded, when our 
low ambitions are shameful, when our dreams once so fair 
have grown repulsive. New revelations have made the 
things that were once right now wrong. A new and larger 
life appeals to us. The Christ appears and he would place 
in your hands the glorious symbol of his cross and say, "By 
this conquer." 

Has not that time come to the Christian Church and the 
Christian man? Life never was so great in opportunity 
and privilege as now. These are stirring times, and in elo- 
quent and appealing words Bishop Foster has described them. 
"Brothers, we have come to a great day. The sixth millennial 
is in its blossom and maturing fruit. Backward rolls the 
long night of dark and troubled ages. Onward comes the 
morning radiant with blessings. The mountain tops are 
already aglow. A little on, and the vast globe will roll 
around in a sea of light, bathing earth and sky in the glory of 
the Lord. 

You have heard the corn growing in the fields — the 
gentle rustle of eager life running along the tender fiber; 
you have heard the incoming of the tide as the sea rises upon 
the land; you have heard the great gales of spring 
chasing away the snows and frosts. Hearken ! do you 
not hear the low murmur of the coming age ; the spirit tread 
of its advancing hosts ; the faint sweet note of its far off but 
ever nearing song, floating along the arches of the descend- 
ing century — the songs and shouts of a redeemed and regen- 
erated world. It is coming brothers ! It is in the promises 
and nothing can stay it ! The long black wings of retreating 
night go hustling down the past ; the rosy wings of morning 
come sweeping up the future ; and the shouts of angels and of 
men usher in the advancing day." 



THE PERSONAL ELEMENT IN THE GOSPEL. 



BY REV. GEORGE E. SCRIMGER, D. D. 

Pastor at Champagne. 

"And I, if I be lifted up from the earth will draw all men unto 
me." — John 12: 32. 

These are certainly remarkable words spoken by a re- 
markable speaker. They are of the nature of a prophecy, 
and at once suggest several alternatives, and raise the ques- 
tion, ''What does this prophecy mean?" It means either a 
supreme egotism and presumption on the part of Christ, 
or a Divine assurance and foreknowledge. When we con- 
sider his humble extraction; the character of Nazareth, his 
native town ; the smallness of Palestine ; and the lack of sym- 
pathetic touch on the part of the Jews with other peoples, 
it seems wonderful that he would claim to draw all men 
unto himself. When we consider, further, the improbability 
of such a result, since the shadows of the cross were already 
gathering about him, and the conviction of desertion by 
his followers and the sorrows of Gethsemane had seized his 
soul, so as to force from him the cry, "Now is my soul 
troubled, and what shall I say ? Father, save me from this 
hour," we are astonished at such assurance. No other hu- 
man being, however fortunate in genius, birth, country, age, 
or popularity, has dared to predict that all men would be 
attracted to him or herself. The claim is unique, and un- 
less the person making it is unique also, it must be unfounded. 
And yet when we think of Christ's life and character, there 
is nothing incongruous or startling in the claim. He is so 
noble and true in every act and utterance that we cannot 



241 



242 THE PERSONAL ELEMENT IN THE GOSPEL. 

entertain for a moment the thought that he is an impostor, 
and is claiming that which he knows he has no right to enjoy. 
He possesses such extraordinary knowledge on all other 
subjects which he touches, and possesses a discernment not 
common to men, so that we cannot believe that he is a 
blinded fanatic. Nor can we suppose that his immediate fol- 
lowers, those disciples who came next in the procession of 
the Christian ages, and the great body of believers in all 
time have been deceived as to his real character. The only 
alternative belief is that which we gladly accept, viz. : this 
prophecy means a Divine foreknowledge and assurance. 

This prophecy means also, either that death by crucifixion 
was essential to man's salvation, or that sacrifice, irrespective 
of mode, was essential for man's redemption. It does not 
necessarily follow, from this scripture or from any scrip- 
ture, that death by crucifixion was necessary for the re- 
demption of mankind. True, "Without shedding of blood 
there is no remission," but it does not follow that Christ's 
blood must be shed by crucifixion. That God who "sees 
the end from the beginning," seeing clearly that the Jews 
would demand his death by such a mode at the hands of 
the Romans, inspired his prophets to so predict, while Christ 
as God foretold his death by this ignominious mode. 

But his sacrificial death was all-essential for our redemp- 
tion. Indeed, there seems to be a universal law of com- 
pensation, whereby any good that comes to man must be 
paid for in compensating sacrifice. It is hinted in nature 
by the tides of oceans; the alternating heat and cold; the 
rain and drought ; the tearing open of earth's bosom to find 
the treasures of grain and fruit; and the crushing of fruit 
and cereals to make the elixir and staff of life. 

Among the forces that reach and mould human life it 
is ever found that the self-abnegation of the martyr, the 
chastisement of the reformer, and the offering up of parental 
life are essential for the advancement of the best life of 



THE PERSONAL ELEMENT IN THE GOSPEL- 



248 



mankind, and the greatest good that ever came to man 
has come through the greatest sacrifice — the death of our 
Savior. 

This prophecy means either that death is fascinating, or 
that character is magnetic. We cannot accept the first alter- 
native, for there is nothing about death per se that is attrac- 
tive. No beauty clothes his skeleton form; no light of joy 
shines from his sightless eyes; and no glow of friendship 
is imparted by the clasp of his bony hand. Death fasci- 
nating! Go ask that heartbroken father as he bends over 
the cold form of his daughter, just budding into a beauti- 
ful and honored womanhood; or that fond mother, as she 
weeps over the still body of her darling son, of whom she 
had hoped so much, or that young man, as he bends before 
the storm of his sorrow, like a reed before a hurricane, and 
in sobbing tones says "Good-bye" to his fair betrothed; or 
that young mother, as she sees death tear away from her 
home the form of her first-born darling babe — ask them if 
death is fascinating ! Oh, no ! From the child dreading 
to look on the face of the dead to the man or woman trying 
to conceal the on-creeping signs of decay — the heralds of 
death — all shrink from death's cold touch. 

But character is the most magnetic force in all the world ! 
It is a greater magnet than gold, or beauty, or social posi- 
tion, for these only have real attraction when owned by a 
character that gives them power. Character is the jewel 
we prize most in men here on the earth, and if we find 
they have it not then their glory departs with them; but if 
they really possess it, then, when freed from the veil of flesh 
which partly hid its charm, their character shines with in- 
creasing luster as the years go by, for "The memory of the 
just is blessed; but the name of the wicked shall rot." So 
it is that truly great characters loom up the more grandly 
as the years go by. 



244 THE PERSONAL ELEMENT IN THE GOSPEL. 

The characters of Paul, and Luther, and Knox, and 
Wesley, and Washington, and Lincoln, like stars when the 
vapors of earth have disappeared, shine the brighter when 
the earthly obscurations have cleared away. . It is the ex- 
alted character of Christ which, because it is the greatest 
of all time, draws with mightiest power all men unto him. 

This was the attraction which certain Greeks, who came 
up to worship at the feast, felt as they said to Philip, "Sir, 
we would see Jesus." These Greeks were types of the whole 
Gentile world that would yet be drawn unto him. 

Once more: This prophecy means either that Christ 
desired to deflect men from the true center of worship in 
devotion to himself, or that element of personal attraction 
was essential to the scheme of redemption. There never 
was a man on earth who made less effort to be popular 
than Jesus of Nazareth ! He never trimmed his sails to 
catch the popular breeze. He rebuked sin so boldly and 
taught such world-embracing truths that his own people re- 
jected him. Many of the people secretly believed in him, 
but for fear of the Jews dared not to openly espouse his 
cause. The hold he had on the popular heart was not due 
to any attempts to lead them in revolt against either eccles- 
iastical or civil authority, for he suppressed at least one 
movement to make him king in its.incipiency — but was due 
to the natural response to his' helpful teachings and sympa- 
thetic heart. No more did he attempt to deflect men from 
allegiance to Heaven's King in devotion to himself. On 
the contrary, he ever manifested the greatest reverence for 
the Father, and subordination to him as his father. He 
even declared that his Father was greater than he, and all 
things which he gave unto his disciples he had first received 
from the Father. He said that he must do the works of 
him who sent him, and taught men to join with him in 
praying to "Our Father who art in heaven." 



THE PERSON AX, ELEMENT IN THE GOSPEL. 245 

After his glorious resurrection and his added power gave 
him greater opportunity to gather men about himself, he 
taught loyalty to his divine Father by his last words and 
act on earth : "It is expedient for you that I go unto the 
Father," and then he ascended unto the heavenly places, 
having accomplished the work which his Father had given 
him to do. Evidently, then, his supreme desire was to be 
the way whereby men might ascend to God ; and his desire 
to draw men unto himself was that he might draw them 
through him unto God. The element of personal attraction 
in Christ, then, is essential to the plan of redemption, and 
the blessed truth confronts us that Christ's attractive char- 
acter is the central feature of the gospel. 

This holy egotism of Christ, "And I, if I be lifted up 
from the earth, will draw all men unto me," is not pre- 
sumption, but the essential force in the world's salvation. 
In this magnetic personality all else reside. His teachings, 
his works, his influence, all flow out of that marvelous self- 
hood, which is the adequate source of them all. We obey 
him not simply because we admire him, but because we 
love him; and he may well appeal unto us, "If ye love me 
keep my commandments." 

I now raise the question, is this prophecy of Christ 
being fulfilled ? I take the position that it is. We may see 
this fulfillment in the growing unity among his followers. 
The complexity which has marked the history of theol- 
ogy is being succeeded by greater simplicity, and nowhere 
is this more plainly seen than in the view of Christ. The 
metaphysical and profitless discussions about the natures 
of Christ are largely done away with, as having to do with 
only the "hem of his garment," while the great personality 
of Christ — great in his personality, yet the most wonderful 
of beings — is holding the attention of his followers. The 
great doctrines which demand attention today are those 
which center in him — his personality, his teachings, his work, 



246 THE PERSONAL ELEMENT IN THE GOSPEL. 

his triumph in the world, and his second coming. The mem- 
bers of the various branches of the church are none the 
less devoted to their churches, but Christ is exalted above 
creed, and only those doctrines which seem to bear most 
closely on Christ's person and work, and which influence 
most Christian character and labor, are emphasized. As 
his followers gather more closely about Christ, they unite 
more fully for Christlike work. 

We see this prophecy fulfilled in Christ's attractive power 
. over thinkers, without regard to church connection. Some 
of the brightest flowers of thought and rhetoric ever grown 
in human minds have been laid at the foot of the Redeemer's 
cross. • Glowing compliments like those given by Rehan 
and Strauss, almost make Christians blush for shame at their 
poor offerings. Criticism or hatred of our Lord can find 
no lodgment in the heart or mind of men; and the judg- 
ment of the generations of mankind, as they march before 
the one immaculate character of Christ, is ever that of Pilate, 
"I find no fault in him." 

Indeed the Christ draws all the nobler expressions of 
thought and sentiment unto himself. The sculptor and 
painter have been provided by Christ with a higher range 
of subjects. One has well said, "The history of the so- 
called fine arts — sculpture, painting, architecture, music and 
poetry, shows that in respect to intrinsic merit, the emo- 
tional portrayals, the shadings and colorings, Christian artists 
have reached the highest standard of the race. In Christ's 
perfect life sculpture finds not only the ideal form, but the 
noblest sentiment for portrayal; painting finds the most 
attractive center for a group that makes the canvas glow; 
architecture, the noblest lessons for spiritual culture which 
may be taught by her creations, as Ruskin showed possible ; 
music hears the song of sweetest melody ; and poetry dis- 
covers the perfect rhythm, coupled with the most beautiful 
thought." 



THE PERSONAL ELEMENT IN THE GOSPEL. 247 

The wise men bringing their offerings of gold, frankin- 
cense and myrrh, was but the prophecy of what we see in 
our day, as from the Orient and Occident, the North and 
the South, gifted men and women bring their noblest offer- 
ings of love and thought, and lay them at his feet. 

The unity of the race, implied in this prophecy, is being 
admitted today by linguists and archeologists everywhere. 
His teaching known as the "Golden Rule" is accepted by 
statesmen as the only basis for the success of republics; 
while the orator finds his loftiest climax turning about the 
magnetic cross. 

This prophecy of our Lord is being fulfilled not only by 
his attraction over men of various types of thought, reli- 
gious and irreligious, of our age and country, but by his mar- 
velous power over all men of all the ages, who have heard 
his glorious name. Although he seemed bound closely to 
his Jewish home and customs ; though he circled about among 
the hills and valleys of his little native land; though his 
speech abounded in parables which framed Jewish scenes 
and manners ; yet there was absolutely nothing local in his 
thought and life-purpose. His lessons are just as appro- 
priate for us today, on the wide-stretching prairies of Illi- 
nois, as for the people dwelling among the rocks of Judea ; 
to those dwelling among the steppes of Russia, as for the 
people dwelling under the fronded palms of tropical isles. 
This magnetic power of Christ is due to the blending in 
him of Divinity and Humanity. His mighty grip on the 
world's love can only be explained by his humanity, and 
his power to change men's lives, and hold them in admira- 
tion as well as love, is explained by his divinity. There 
is absolutely no half-way point. It will not do to regard 
him as the most divine of men, but we must, in view of 
his claims and life, look upon him as the God-man. The 
reverence of Paul for the Master, to whom he was a bond- 
slave; the picture left us by the Evangelists and John in 



248 THE PERSONAL ELEMENT IN THE GOSPEL. 

Revelation ; his acceptance of the title God, and his cor- 
responding perfect life and acts of power, demand cur 
worship of him as Divine. 

In the expression, "lifted up from the earth," I see his 
dual nature set forth. The expression "Lifted up," in 
scripture refers often to exaltation in power and character. 
He is "lifted up," but "from the earth." There are human 
ties which join him to earth through his humanity, but 
he is "lifted up" in his Deity to the very heavens, i.nd 
thus lifted up, highly exalted, he draws all men unto him. 

I am thinking of my ascent of Pike's Peak. For days, 
as I wandered through the "Garden of the Gods," or visited 
the wonderful caves near by, or looked out from my hotel, 
the lofty summit of the Peak attracted me to its noble 
height. At last the rare privilege came and I began that 
notable ride of twenty-two miles on the journey up the 
heights. Often my attention was drawn to other objects. 
I looked upon the huge rocks in grotesque form, and 
dreamed of the primeval upheaval; now I caught a view 
of the snowy range; and then I saw the garden parks, 
with mountains for their garden walls. I passed the half- 
way house and stopped at Glen Cove for lunch, where I 
witnessed the battle of the clouds. Often the summit of 
the mountain was lost to view, but all the while I felt its 
mighty pull. Past rocks and through canons, around curves 
and by the edge of precipices the fascinating summit pulled 
me, until I stood upon it, saw the billowy clouds breaking 
noiselessly against the mountain side far beneath me, and 
looked out and out on the ocean-like plain, the forest of 
mountain peaks, and the threads of winding rivers far 
away. There were others there who had felt the same 
witchery of the mountain spell. A few had walked, some 
had ridden on> donkeys, and others — like myself — had come 
in hacks. But no matter! Though coming by different 
modes of travel, and up different sides of the great moun- 



THE PERSONAL, ELEMENT IN THE GOSPEL. 249 



tain, we stood together upon the height, thrilled with awful 
delight. So on Calvary, of greater spiritual altitude than 
the famous Peak, there stands the cross of Christ, and all 
men on the great world-plains and among the foothills 
of local environment feel this magnetic pull of the cruci- 
fied Lord, and though by different paths, we are coming to 
him, for all converge at his blessed feet. This attraction, 
if followed to the legitimate conclusion, leads to pardon of 
sin and a re-creation into his image. It is Christ on the 
cross, dying for sinners, that is to draw men. Mere ad- 
miration of his peerless character will not save us. Ideal 
beauty never changed men's hearts. As one has said, "Al- 
though never yet surpassed in his art, Phidias did not reno- 
vate the Greeks by the sculptor's chisel ; nor did the gay 
Venetians become devout and meek as the Moravians by 
matchless skill in color and shade. The unequaled power 
of the Florentines to picture human emotions did nothing 
to regenerate their age. Even the picture galleries at the 
Chicago Exposition were no match for the Moody meetings." 

Christ must save us if He ever draws us to a pure life and 
the heavenly world. We must yield to Christ as did the 
dying soldier of whom Mr. Moody tells : "After the battle of 
Pittsburg Landing and Murfreesboro, he was in a hospital 
at Murfreesboro. One night, after midnight, he ' was 
awakened and told that there was a man who wanted 
to see him. He went to him and he called Mr. 
Moody "Chaplain," and said he wanted him to help him 
die. Mr. Moody said, " I'd take you right up in my arms 
and carry you into the kingdom of God if I could, but I 
can't do it. I can't help you die." And the soldier said, 
"Who can?" Mr. Moody said, "The Lord Jesus Christ; He 
came for that purpose." He shook his head and said, "He 
can't save me ; I've been such a sinner." Mr. Moody knew 
the mother of the dying man, in the north, and he knew 
that she was anxious for him to die right, and so he re- 



-50 THE PERSONAL ELEMENT IN THE GOSPEL. 



mained with him. He prayed with him, and then read 
from the third chapter of John. When he read the four- 
teenth and fifteenth verses he caught up the words, "As 
Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must 
the Son of Man be lifted up; that whosoever believeth on 
Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." He stopped 
him and said, "Is that true?" Moody said "Yes," and he 
asked him to read it again. He did so. The soldier clasped 
his hands together and said, "That's good ; won't you read 
it again ?" He read it the third time, and went on with the 
chapter. When he finished the eyes of the dying man were 
closed, and there was a smile on his face. Oh, how it was 
lighted up ! His lips were quivering, and as Mr. Moody 
leaned over him he heard, in a faint whisper, "As Moses lifted 
up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man 
be lifted up ; that whosoever believeth on Him should not 
perish, but have everlasting life." He opened his eyes and 
said, "That's enough, don't read any more." He pillowed 
his head on those two verses, and then went up in one of 
Christ's chariots, and took his seat in the kingdom of God. 

O blessed Christ. Thou uplifted One, exert thy matchless 
drawing power here and now, and may all hearts yield to 
Thee and be drawn, through the bogs and blight of sin, up 
to a pure life, even up to the radiant heights of the hills of 
glory ! 



THE SPHERE OF THE STATE AS TO EDUCATION. 



BY REV. W. H. WILDER, D. D v 

Presiding Elder of Champaign District. 

THE STATE DEFINED. 

"The State is the entire people under one supreme civil 
government." It is a civil self-governing' community of 
men ; or, as Woolsey defines it : "A state is a community of 
persons living within certain limits of territory under a per- 
manent organization which aims to secure the privileges of 
justice by self-imposed law." The bond of union in such a 
state is not found in its formulated laws, but rather in the 
universal brotherhood of the persons composing the state. 

These individuals have common rights and common privi- 
leges because they have common natures. In the deepest and 
truest conception of the state, it is composed of the entire 
human race. It is a world-wide, universal brotherhood. 
Hence it is permanent, fundamental, natural, divine, spring- 
ing out of the essential nature of man. Its forms of expres- 
sion change, governments issue and pass away ; but the state 
abides. This conception of the stalte is sometimes presented 
under a mystic word borrowed from biology. The state is 
viewed as an organism, — the organic brotherhood of man. 
But this simile, now being ridden so furiously by political 
and social economists as if it were a recent discovery, pos- 
sessing the key to the solution of all problems, has rendered 
service from ancient 'times, and has contributed as much to 
hazy thinking, as any other analogy. Its use therefore must 
be with discrimination. It must not include physiological 
interdependence, an interdependence of organs or of parts ; 

251 



252 



THE SPHERE OF THE STATE 



but an interdependence of persons. For the individuality of 
man, personality, a unitary somewhat, self-conscious, and 
conscious of self-determination is an element likewise funda- 
mental, necessary, and permanent in the state. 

The term "state" as an organism is a general notion, and 
its reality consists only in the individual persons constituting 
the brotherhood. These two ideas : the unity of the race and 
the individuality of man, are absolutely fundamental to a ra- 
tional conception of the state ; and any theory of government 
that overlooks either of them, cannot attain to the highest 
aim of the state, which must be justice in perfect harmony 
with the greatest well-being of all the members of the state. 

THE GOVERNMENT NOT THE STATE. 

The government as thus distinguished from the state is 
the method of the state in performing its functions. Sov- 
ereignty lodges in the state, but not in the government. As 
the intelligence and morals of the individuals of the state in- 
crease, governments change from a less to a more just 
form, and more perfectly perform their functions. The 
stages in the evolution of government are explained by corre- 
sponding stages in the evolution of the two basal attributes 
of the state: the individuality of the man, and the unity of 
the race. Governments, however, being consequent, always 
inadequately represent these ideas as held by the foremost 
individuals ; hence governments never perfectly realize their 
aim. Did conditions obtain under which that aim could be 
fully realized, governments would be exceedingly simple, if 
needed at all. 

Such is our conception of the state and its relations to 
government. 

What is meant by "Education"? As a process, is it a 
putting on; or, is it a leading out? Is it energy stimulated 
from without but working within, or is it energy working 
wholly from without? Is the teacher an architect, a car- 
penter? Or, is he more than these ? 



AS*"fO EDUCATION. 



253 



Is the subject of education a product of heredity and 
environment; or is it a product of heredity, environment, 

and will? 

NATURE OF THE SUBJECT TO BE EDUCATED. 

Reflection on (the nature of the subject to be educated is 
necessary to clear thinking. 

The child is certainly more than a seed which has in it 
the potentiality of a tree or an animal. It is something more 
than organism. Life and force shape organisms. All living 
forms are moulded, but not f orm, or motion, or electro- 
moulded. In all living matter there is in each primitive cell, 
a somewhat, whether the cell is to expand into a fish or 
reptile, bird or quadruped, ape or man, that secretes, assimi- 
lates, moulds, controls and discards matter for its own pur- 
pose, and after its own law of being. In so doing, it pro- 
claims its distinctness from and superiority over mere mat- 
ter. No juggling of words can satisfy consciousness that 
thought, feeling and volition are the results of the motion or 
grouping of matter. Thought in its more simple as well as 
its complex and higher forms of memory and reasoning is 
inexplicable except on 'the hypothesis of a self-acting mind, 
or person that abides through "the dance of the atoms," 
reaches back over the chasms of the past, and takes unto 
itself, making them its own, varied experiences through the 
stretch of first consciousness to the last manifestation of life. 

What the cell or ovum of all inferior orders of life shall 
bring forth is absolutely predetermined. _ Forces only from 
without can prevent the development to the extent of ma- 
turity and perfection according to its kind. While the laws 
of thought and of intellectual and moral development are 
also predetermined in the mind of the child, there is one ele- 
ment which renders the outcome as to quality of knowledge, 
and as to quality of moral character, altogether problematic ; 
that element is freedom. 

The state, society, the home, the schools and the church — 
all these by their combined influences cannot eliminate that 



254 



The sphere of the state 



element of uncertainty from the quality of knowledge, 
or of moral character. While they may be responsible for 
not furnishing better facilities and more rational stimuli for 
the intellect and the affections, the essence of responsibility 
for both ignorance and unregenerativeness lies with the indi- 
vidual. 

Whatever may be its heredity or environment, for every 
child in the state, it is regeneration, sanctification and glorifi- 
cation, or it is degeneration, degradation and damnation. 

Which it will be in any given case, by virture of his con- 
stituent element of personality, can be determined only by 
the individual himself. It is as easy to go wrong as i't is to 
go right. There is a tendency downward as well as upward. 

From the dawn of consciousness it is a war between the 
divine and the diabolic in man's nature. Every step taken 
toward the development of his higher powers and the perfec- 
tion of his moral character is taken over this subdued, but not 
destroyed, tendency. It is man's Philistine; even though van- 
quished ten thousand times, it never dies. Though so nearly 
allied to God, as has been argued again and again, man has 
been, and still is a prey to appetites and passions, morbid and 
beastly — to thinking most inconsistent and irrational — to 
loves and practices which tend immeasurably below the level 
of the brute. The bud unfolds the flower, the flower gives 
place to the fruit ; the acorn germinates and the tree reaches 
perfection of development ; the animal almost as soon as 
dropped from the dam instinctively cares for itself — fills its 
stomach with water and grass for which it has not labored — 
and develops into 'the perfection of its kind without effort, 
because it is not troubled with this counter tendency. I do not 
forget the blighted and arrested development ; but note that 
the blight and arrest are determined by forces lying wholly 
outside of the bud blighted and of the being arrested in its 
development, and not by perverse tendencies in their own 
constitution. 



AS TO EDUCATION. 



255 



As man struggles to rise toward the perfection of his 
character "he finds that he has to wage an uncompromising 
warfare against hereditary taints of blood, against morbid 
instincts and low passions, against inherent selfishness and 
meanness, against tyrant habi'ts engendered in the reckless- 
ness of youth. In the presence of these giants of evil with 
their fetters of iron he stands appalled, and against his 
temptation and sins, even against society itself, he feels he 
must call upon God for help. Through divine help he may 
conquer; without it, never." {Coker.) This necessity for 
aid is not imposed by men upon themselves ; it grows out of 
the nature of human life. Exercising the divine endowment 
to know, man looks upon himself and knows self aspiring 
to be, yet helpless of himself to become; he looks upon the 
universe, and knows it to be inadequate to meet the demands * 
of either reason or feeling; he looks un ! to God. Failing to 
find resources for loftiest character either in himself or the 
Universe, where else can he look ? 

Self, the Universe, and God, set the limit to human 
thought. Hence as the roots of the tree strike downward 
for moisture, the affectional nature allies itself with that 
which is conceived to be God. This religious instinct, this 
feeling after God, and this desire to know and commune 
with him are facts as certainly established as any fact of 
physics, biology or chemistry. No law of matter is more 
certainly established than this, that the moral character 
is assimilated to the character of the object upon which 
supreme thought and affection are bestowed. To ignore 
these facts and this law in any complete system of education 
is as irrational and unscientific as to ignore any essential fact 
or law of physical science. 

Human nature is religious. Man is endowed with a "de- 
lirious yet divine desire to know" ; but this divine desire to 
love is not less original. It is as natural for him to pray as 
it is for him to speak; for him to love and worship as it is 



256 



TH^ SPHERE) OF THE; STATE 



for him to think and classify knowledge. The postulates 
of his moral nature are as fundamental to life and well being 
as are those of cognition. 

This somewhat extended though inadequate discussion 
of the nature of the individual which is the unit in the state 
has been made because it is fundamental to my subject. A 
false or one-sided conception of the subject to be educated 
would necessarily lead to false conceptions of the true aim 
and the right method of education. The theory any man 
holds as to personality will determine his theory of the Uni- 
verse, of knowledge and of education. 

EDUCATION. 

"There are two clearly marked tendencies in higher edu- 
. cation in America today. Not long ago there was but one. 
Our early historic American colleges trace their origin di- 
rectly to Oxford and Cambridge. The Anglo-Saxon brand 
was on them. But the new universities in America, and 
particularly the state universities, have their lines running 
straight to Germany. Berlin, Heidelberg, Leipsic and Got- 
tingen are increasingly influential in American institutions. 
Many bear almost exclusively the Teutonic stamp. And 
•these two ideals, the Anglo-Saxon and the Teutonic, contend 
for supremacy. Their meaning is clear to us all. 

"The Anglo-Saxon makes for cultured character. The 
Teutonic theory looks toward the expert, the specialist, 
towards culture as an end." (McDowell.) 

•Man's brilliant, even dazzling achievements in the world 
of sense have served to throw upon too many an hypnotic 
spell in which they are asleep to things which far more 
nearly concern them. More self-conceited, shallow and irrev- 
erent than Protagorus, even, who, after dropping his plumb- 
line to the bottom of the universe, declared that man is the 
measure of all things, they display the motto: "Matter the 
measure of all things ; bread the end of all human energy." 



AS TO EDUCATION. 



257 



Schools exist for one purpose only — to train men for spe- 
cial craft and trades. If they do this well, they are useful; 
if they do not, they are good for nothing. The belief in any 
ulterior end beyond this is derided and ridiculed. 

On the other hand it is contended that there should be 
an ulterior end in education ; that education means the draw- 
ing out that which is potentially in man, and that the best 
and the completest education is in disciplining all the soul's 
energies and powers to the highest pitch and in directing 
them to the highest and best ends. To accomplish this the 
plastic mind of youth must be brought into contact with 
things, with physical and mechanical forces in action. It 
is also necessary to bring the mind into contact 
with the best and greatest in the thought, feelings, purposes 
and deeds of action and sufferings of men in all ages, in 
order that by these the soul may be stimulated to truer 
thoughts, holier feelings, purer purposes, greater deeds and 
more god-like sufferings. Our theory of the aim or end of 
education is formulated by Chancellor McDowell : "First — 
It embraces knowledge of all truth in literature, history, 
science and life. Second— It embraces threefold training and 
discipline of the individual. Third — It embraces the Chris- 
tian philosophy of life and conduct. Fourth — It is consum- 
mated in a personal knowledge of Jesus Christ." 

This includes all that is meant by Prof. Huxley when he 
says : "Education is the instruction of the intellect in the 
laws of nature, under which name I include not merely 
things and their forces, but men and their ways, and the 
fashioning of the affections and the will into an earnest 
and loving desire to move in harmony with these laws." 
While this is an exalted view of education, and Mr. Huxley 
said that it meant to him nothing more or less than this, to 
me education does mean something more; and that some- 
thing more is "an earnest and loving desire" to harmonize 
my will and affections with that Almighty Power that estab- 
lished the laws of nature. 



258 



THE SPHERE OF THE STATE 



HOW CAN SUCH AN END BE OBTAINED ? 

Can the teacher or school transmit it to< the student ? 

In- education, transmission is impossible except in a high- 
ly figurative sense. As I think and give vocal utterance to 
my thoughts, there is no thought now leaving me and enter- 
ing bodily into you. Though by means of vocal utterance, I 
cause a vibration of air waves and excite nervous action in 
you, neither nervous action nor air waves contain thought, 
no matter how clearly or vigorously I may think and you 
understand. According to a mysterious law or order of mat- 
ter and mind, I avail myself of a system of excitations where- 
by your mind is incited to unfold itself and think my thoughts 
after me. Thus the teacher and the schools transmit noth- 
ing, but can excite the mind to take possession of itself. See 
Bowne. Hence their function is to arouse and stimulate the 
soul energies, and direct their activity. There is no educa- 
tion for the student in any school under any teacher until 
he is awake. 

The student who wins is always awake. He is awake 
to the sublime truth that there is something to be known, 
that its knowledge is desirable, and that it is possible to 
him ; he is awake to the fact that this thing is to be gained 
only by the exercise of his own energies, and cannot be 
poured into* him as an empty receptacle, or passed over to 
him by a teacher while he remains passive. He knows, as 
physical skill and strength are acquired by the exercise of 
original powers, so intellectual vigor and power come by 
mental gymnastic exercise, and he covets that exercise. He 
values professors and books as guides and inspiration, and 
not as apparatus that turns out so much knowledge ready 
made for his benefit without cost, save "the money he has paid 
out for his tuition. They may interest, entertain, and in- 
struct hirn, but he knows that if he successfully makes the 
high kick or jump, or puts the shot, or throws the hammer, 
or vaults the pole, or runs the fifty or one hundred dash, 



AS TO EDUCATION. 259 

he must exert his own energies and discipline his own 
powers, Yes, he is awake. He has the power to Jcnow, and 
he knows. He has eyes to see, and he sees. He has ears to 
hear, and he hears. Attention and action, mental action, 
are the words. Let a student give these and come in touch 
with a live teacher and he will win. He need not be bril- 
liant, nor need he possess extraordinary talent, or what is 
ordinarily called talent, at all ; for the habit of attention and 
wisely directed mental energy beget extraordinary power. 
Such a student does not perform his work perfunctorily, 
counting the number of hours as they drearily pass, but 
practice Mr. Edison's advice and seldom look at the clock. 

It is by the same methods that the ethical and religious 
side of his nature is educated. Conscience has so little to do 
in the practical affairs of men because it has received such 
slight stimulus and direction in education. When it is brought 
from under its present arrest of development caused by the 
secularism of the age and receives the attention it deserves 
in a rational system, society, civilly and socially, will find a 
sturdier disturber. 

THE FUNCTION OF THE STATE. 

The distinction between the State and the Government 
must be kept in the field of vision. 

"There are certain great and fundamental rights and in- 
terests which precede government. If men had perfect 
insight and good will there would be no need of society as 
a restraining or coercive power. There would be wisdom 
to understand the conditions of life and the common good 
and there would be the will to co-operate in securing it. 
Society as an aggregate of individuals would meet all the 
demands of personal and social development. Out of their 
interaction with the social and physical environment, the 
social order and mechanism would arise without any gov- 
ernmental intervention. Even as it is, economical, intellec- 
tual, and spiritual interests generally flourish better when 



260 



TH^ sphere of the state 



left to individuals and voluntary organization than when 
undertaken by the state." (Bowne.) But such conditions 
do not obtain. Men lack both insight and good will. Hence 
the rise of governments. 

Because of the lack of good will and the existence of 
positive ill will, at least in the form of selfishness, govern- 
ments arise to guard the individual in his natural rights. To 
prevent injustice, to secure justice, and to conserve the 
common good, this must be its fundamental function, what- 
ever be its form. Deeper than any formulated rule or law for 
the government of the individual or of the mass, there is 
moral law as a subjective principle; also a fixed mental and 
world-order which founds the natural rights of the individ- 
ual, and in which individuals and governments must find 
the warrant for whatever they do. Any law of human gov- 
ernment must harmonize with this subjective and funda- 
mental law if it is to survive in the interests of well being. 
Government should not be a rule of might over the weak or 
of tyranny of a majority over a minority, but rather a subor- 
dination of rulers and ruled, of majorities and minorities to 
the common good. Therefore, whatever governments may 
do, they should not do anything against the common good. 
The actions of governments, like the actions of individuals, 
should lie wholly within the field of that which is conducive 
to the common weal. It does not follow, however, that an 
individual is under obligation to do everything that lies 
within that field. It is under this false notion that certain 
men enter into an oath that they will neither eat nor sleep 
until they have reformed every evil in the home, in society 
and in the state. 

Neither does it follow that the government is under 
obligation to do everything that lies within that field. It is 
under this false notion that small men with overheated 
brains propose to exorcise all social and political ills by 
socialism. Individualism with its necessary implication, 



AS TO EDUCATION. 261 

competition, must go, and the 'state must perform the func- 
tions of both producer and distributer. Such forget that "as 
to its adaptation to actual men, nothing could be more 
insane than the fancy that society is to be redeemed by 
removing the motives to individual effort which lie in pri- 
vate property and private ambition." 

Such is the problem. With these principles in view, we 
inquire, 

WHAT IS THE DUTY OF THE GOVERNMENT AS TO EDUCATION ? 

Under such a government as that of the United States of 
America, which I verily believe to be most nearly ideal of 
any on earth, universal education is of the highest impor- 
tance; indeed, general intelligence and general morality are 
absolutely essential to its perpetuity. 

It was not because of the want of insight as to the neces- 
sity of religion to the stability of the government and well 
being of the people that our fathers ordained an absolute 
and perpetual divorcement of the government from religion ; 
but rather because of a deeper insight into the nature of per- 
sonality and true religion. Documentary evidence is too 
abundant for any doubt on this point. They gave Christianity 
its highest sanction and true religion its best support in leav- 
ing religion free and untrammeled by the government; and 
in that sanction made Christianity — broad, catholic, tolerant 
Christianity, as Mr. Webster declared — the law of the land. 
It is also a fatal, but common and inexcusable, blunder to 
view the Church in the United States of America as the 
Church of history since the day of Constantine. The con- 
version of the Emperor is looked upon as the conquest of 
heathenism, but it had some elements of a Waterloo to 
Christianity. To guard against secularizing religion, our 
founders declared that the church and the government 
should be forever ineligible to the bonds of holy wedlock. 
So long as I believe in God as my Father and in. Jesus 
Christ, His Son, my Saviour, and retain citizenship in the 



262 THK SPHERE OF THE STATE 

As 

greatest republic on earth", I will protest against their 
entering into matrimony; no less vigorously will I protest 
against their committing adultery either openly or secretly. 
Not a dollar of public money for Church purposes is one 
of the first articles of my creed. If you say this does not 
make me less, but more, a churchman, I am content ; because 
it does not make me less a patriot. 

It appears, then, that for the religious side of education 
the government should do nothing directly at public expense. 
What then? Shall education be irreligious, or at best, non- 
religious? Not by any means. Shall it be given only by 
private beneficence, or the Church? Most emphatically no. 
What then should the government do? 

1. Since the stability of our government and the well 
being of the people depend on universal intelligence and 
morality, it should determine a standard of intelligence for 
all the people and require every child in the state to measure 
up to that standard. Among the requirements should be the 
teaching of the common, or elementary, branches in the Eng- 
lish language in every school, whether it be public or private. 
If any parent should desire to give the required, instruction 
in his own) house or in a private school, he should not be 
denied the privilege ; nevertheless such school and instruction 
should be under the inspection and subject to the approval 
of the government. 

2. It should provide and maintain at public expense 
schools in which the instruction required could be given 
to every child under the government. Special attention 
should be given to the primary and elementary grades in 
order that there may be no necessity in the higher school and 
after life for unlearning what has been taught at so much 
expense. 

What about the religious element? It should be pro- 
vided for in the home and in the church. The primary obli- 
gation to teach both letters and religion rests with the par- 



AS TO EDUCATION. 



263 



ent. That obligation as to religion cannot be wisely 
delegated to another during the period of secondary educa- 
tion, though the church may contribute largely for the same 
end. During this period the child is at home and under the 
direct influence, teaching and example of the parent who is 
the original priest and who officiates at the holiest of holy 
altars, — the hearthstone. It should also be noted that the 
knowledge of letters and things can be taught at this period 
without raising the religious question. Hence the school 
need not be irreligious though it may not be religious, and 
at the same time without neglect of the ethical and religious 
nature. 

Without violence to religious conviction, or neglect of 
religious duty to the child, general intelligence may thus be 
secured for all the people at the least expense. 

PROFESSIONAL SCHOOLS FOR TEACHERS. 

3. When not otherwise provided for, the government 
should establish and maintain at public expense, training 
schools for teachers for the public schools. But such schools, 
in so far as they are maintained at public expense, should per- 
form but one function. They should not be schools of in- 
struction for the acquisition of such knowledge as may be 
obtained in high schools; but rather professional in their 
character, schools of methods of teaching. The standard for 
admission should not be below the equivalent of the 
education to be obtained in the public high school, and 
the applicant should be required to obligate himself to devote 
all his energies to teaching for a definite term of years. The 
reason for the limitation to professional work is found in 
the fact that the public high school, in this system, is gen-' 
eral, and the public should be exempt from a double taxation 
for the same thing. The ground for such a professional school 
lies in the necessity for such general intelligence as the public 
school provides for the safety of the government and the well 
being of the people. The proviso, "when not otherwise pro- 



264 



THE SPHERE OF THE STATE 



vided for," is based on the general and broad principle that 
no tax should be levied on the people for anything which is 
being efficiently and sufficiently done by private beneficence. 

The reason for the obligation to teach for a definite 
term of years is that the state should always demand in re- 
turn for its contribution to the individual through the gov- 
ernment by taxation one hundred cents on every dollar, if 
not in kind, yet in value. 

4. Until nations shall have learned war no more, mili- 
tary schools should be maintained at public expense for 
public defense. This nation will not be in condition to 
safely neglect them until the ethical element becomes much 
stronger in our education. Besides these, I know no obli- 
gation on the government to maintain professional or spe- 
cial schools. 

COLLEGIATE AND UNIVERSITY EDUCATION. 

It is quietly assumed that our government is under obli- 
gation to carry on the work of education in these spheres 
also, and it is intimated that if private beneficence had not 
already established and endowed a few colleges, no such 
colleges or universities should be tolerated. The ground 
of the assumption is that learning must be perpetuated, that 
private beneficence is inadequate, and if adequate it should 
be bestowed on the heathen, and that private schools are 
narrow, and hence not fit to survive. They are passing 
away, it is said, especially those that are Christian in founda- 
tion, spirit and life. 

Over against this last item of the assumption, it might 
, be contended that it is the duty of somebody to guard the 
gates as the Christian colleges pass, and see to it that com- 
mon honesty and true virtue do not pass away with them. 
When these colleges do pass, except they pass into colleges 
more positively Christian, a new social and political era 
will dawn ; but it will be amazingly like some old eras from 



AS TO EDUCATION. 



265 



whose darkness and wretchedness the flower of Europe 
escaped to found a free- church in a free state. 

As to the main assumption that the government should 
carry on the work of education in colleges and universities, 
it is contended that that depends. 

LEARNING SHOULD BE PERPETUATED. 

But it should not be perpetuated simply for its own sake. 
Learning is not necessarily good. 

"There is death in the university pot unless the influence 
of genuine evangelical religion can be introduced. Knowl- 
edge is power, but give a bad man power and it makes him 
worse. The most learned men in the world were the men 
that brought on the horrors of the first French Revolution. 
They were orators and sages and patriots, but were without 
the spirit of religion, and consequently the more they knew 
the worse they were. And there are men now walking to 
and fro in the United States spreading doctrines most terri- 
ble on God's day and every day. No one can declare that 
those socialists and anarchists are ignorant. No one can de- 
clare that the lawyer who is making a practice of destroying 
men's hopes is ignorant. He is learned, he is eloquent, but the 
more he knows the more power he has against religion the 
more power he has so as to earn the dread title of a patron 
of suicide." (Buckley.) 

Ex-Governor Pattison in an address at the nation's capi- 
tal, Oct. 21, 1896, on the occasion of the laying of the corner 
stone of the building of the College of History in the Ameri- 
can University, said : 

"Here in this university are we to attempt not only 
intellectual development, but more than all that — moral and 
religious training. The world has tried intellectuality. We 
are today in our colleges and in our universities finding out 
classics in the nations which have demonstrated unusual 
intellectuality, yet they have no place in the world of today. 
It was not possible to sustain them by mere intellectuality. 



266 



THE SPHERE OF THE STATE 



They have tried physical culture. The supremacy of phy- 
sical culture has been demonstrated by the nations of an- 
tiquity, and yet, notwithstanding the perfection of intellect- 
ual culture, the perfection of physical culture, nations have 
gone down, although attaining the highest supremacy in 
both. So that we must seek for something else for the 
permanency of government, and I believe we have it in the 
purpose of this university. In other words, in the moral and 
religious training there is to come that stability which is to 
give permanency to our government and to our people. 
Indeed, our hopes are in the elevation of the moral above 
the merely intellectual and physical. Do not misunderstand 
me for one moment to deprecate the highest effort toward 
the highest physical and intellectual attainment, but above 
them all is that higher religious influence which is to make 
the other two stable." 

In his farewell address, Washington uttered words his 
countrymen would do well to ponder: "Of all the disposi- 
tions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion 
and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would 
that man claim the tribute of patriotism, who should labor 
to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these 
firmest props of the duties of men and citizens. The mere 
politician equally with the pious man ought to respect and 
to cherish them. A volume could not trace all . their con- 
nections with private and public felicity. Let it simply be 
asked, where is the security for property, for reputation, 
for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, 
which are the instruments of investigation in courts of jus- 
tice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that 
morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever 
may be conceded to the influence of refined education on 
minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both for- 
bid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclu- 
sion, of religious principle," 



AS TO EDUCATION. 



267 



The estimates of the most 'eminent sociologists of the 
country and the most carefully prepared statistics showing 
an increase in the more serious crimes, crimes against hu- 
manity and life, "are sadly suggestive of a failure in our 
scheme of education. The spread of mere secular educa- 
tion does not work a diminution of crime. The moral es- 
sence is not sufficiently strong in our treatment of youth." 

Again, it can be successfully argued that the government 
should not do for an individual wlhat he can do for himself. 
Upon any other theory the individual is apt to do nothing 
for himself and seek by hook or crook to get the government 
to do for him. 

Self-reliance is an essential element in a strong state. 
The individual has self-reliance depressed when he is not 
put under the necessity of doing for himself. Self-reliance 
on the part of the individual is a test of the strength of the 
state. It will not be, it cannot be best developed while the 
government freely furnishes him that which he can easily 
secure for himself. 

Direct help is not always most helpful to the individual 
or the masses. Usually indirect help only is truly helpful. 
Without struggle, and the conditions making for severe 
struggle, development of sturdy, self-reliant character is 
impossible. When government freely and directly furnishes 
what the individual or class can do for themselves, society 
is weakened and not helped. A policy that has a tendency 
to make mendicants is not wise. A charity that pauperizes 
is an unkindness. All public policies which open up un- 
necessary temptations to corruption should be avoided. 

It must be conceded that a higher education that does 
not burnish the very best conditions for the development of 
the ethical and religious as well as the development of the 
intellectual, is faulty. Such education is not the best in 
quality ; for it is blind on one side. The idea of God, rever- 
ence and love for Him, the rational relation of man to Him, 



268 



THE SPHERE OF THE STATE 



proper attitude of soul toward Him, are some ideas that 
must be emphasized. 

If there is anything in heredity and environment — and 
there is much — then such secularism furnishes environment 
well calculated to destroy those ideas and reverse or pervert 
the ethical and religious in human nature. Faith, hope, de- 
voutness of spirit, holiness of will and life are some of these 
essential elements which go to make up the best environment 
for the growth of a perfect man. If men are to be religious 
while taking on their growth, they must breathe a religious 
atmosphere. Hence, I would contend that on the ground 
of heredity and environment the college and university 
should be positively religious ; not theoretically simply, but 
actually. 

It has not been very long that the representative advo- 
cates of government universities have recognized the neces- 
sity of the religious element in education; in fact, some do 
not now recognize it, and none of them would have done so 
but for the influence of the Christian college. Though the 
religious nature of man is now recognized by many, they 
know not what to do with it. Some of them would exorcise 
it by means of literary, scientific, and aesthetic culture, re- 
garding it simply as only one of the necessary manifesta- 
tions of human nature in its various stages of evolution. 
It cannot be ignored. Until by means of the university the 
church has been so perfectly evolved that it shows no more 
signs of religiousness, the government must recognize relig- 
ion. What to do with it is the question. The collegiate and 
university student is away from home and its restraint and 
its moral and religious influence, it is a time when he begins 
to test his powers, and to scrutinize the tenets of childhood, 
home and mother; the .'situation is critical. If the youth 
ever needed positive Christian precept, sympathetic and 
loving Christian example in teacher, and a pure evangelical 
atmosphere for the life and development of a holy will and 



AS TO EDUCATION. 



269 



loving life, it is now. It is now the kingdom of God which 
is in us unfolds or gives place to atrophy of religious con- 
sciousness, and to the kingdom of faithlessness and hope- 
lessness ; he uses his eyes and sees God, or he becomes blind 
and dead on the best side of his nature. 

The government, from the very nature of the case, can- 
not supply this element. Its higher schools must be gov- 
erned by politicians. They instinctively perceive the objec- 
tion of theist and atheist, of Jew and infidel, of Protestant and 
Catholic, and the result must necessarily be an attempt to 
suppress all that belongs to the negations of each class. An 
attempt at neutrality is inevitable. But in the sphere of 
higher education a neutral position in respect to religion 
cannot be maintained. Pure mathematics, abstract logic, 
physical sciences, when confined strictly to succession of 
phenomena, may be so taught. But what mathematician con- 
fines himself to pure mathematics? What logician to pure- 
abstractions? What physical scientist to mere succession of 
phenomena? Such'teachers are yet unborn, and should they 
come forth by any process of gestation or evolution, they will 
not be human ; hence they will be deficient in some essential 
element of true pedagogues for men as they are now. 

I am aware that it is contended that the government col- 
lege or university should be as nearly neutral as possible on 
the subject of religion, and that it is the business of the 
church and the religionist to cure whatever defect may re- 
main. 

But what moral right has the government to throw 
"death into the pot" and then call upon the prophet to save 
society from its deadly effects? He who poisons the foun- 
tain in order to deepen it and increase its pressure should 
first possess the power to purify and sweeten it ; otherwise 
it were better if the fountain were not deepened. What moral 
right has the government to put out the eyes of our youth, 
or kill them, and then call upon the church to exercise its 



270 



THE SPHERE OF THE STATE 



miraculous power, if it has any, in restoring their sight and 
raising them from the dead? 

"A state institution which should undertake to limit its 
energies to the teaching of science, and the mechanic and in- 
dustrial arts, would be a sorry failure, unless it gave also 
classic and literary instruction. These latter are the great 
agencies in the development of the spiritual nature. To leave 
them out is to give an inevitable bias and trend to the mind 
toward materialism." (Geo. P. Brown.) 

"The chief danger to student life in the collegiate and 
university period lies not, as so often assumed, in the tend- 
ency of those naturally weak or wayward to be led astray by 
evil companions ; it lies in the fact that the highest and best 
minds, the most candid and earnest souls, are from their de- 
votion to the pursuit of knowledge liable to experience a 
deadening of the spiritual consciousness. Those students in 
whom is revealed the most marked capacity for large service 
to humanity, may thus go forth .with the highest part of 
their natures undeveloped, lacking that spiritual force which 
multiplies tenfold the influence of every kind of ability for 
good work in the world. Intensity of intellectual life, from 
the very juxtaposition of minds interested in many fields of 
thought, but all bent upon like ends, seems to increase with 
the size of universities ****** 

"Experience has shown, it seems to me, that the remedy 
to meet this defect in advanced education, to offset the tend- 
encies that make for the effacement of the spiritual life, can- 
not be found in the activity of the local churches in uni- 
versity towns, no matter how earnest and efficient they may 
be. It must lie in teaching, not so much in the teaching of 
religion as in the teaching of the Bible ; and that, too, from 
the English form as a starting point. It is not enough to 
give courses in Hellenistic Greek and in Hebrew, as the uni- 
versity now does, with the minute study of portions of the 
Scriptures in those tongues. These courses from the nature 



AS TO EDUCATION. 



271 



of the case are available for only a small number of students, 
and are linguistic in their scope. Courses should be offered 
which will undertake the interpretation of the Bible as 
literature, as history and philosophy. Into them should go a 
scholarship second to that of no other chair, expressed 
through the medium of a warm and earnest spiritual nature. 
This instruction in the Bible cannot be and ought not to 
be- given at the expense of the state." (Francis W. Kelsey, 
Michigan University.) 

Here is a recognition of the necessity of attention to the 
religious nature during the college period, the great and 
fatal danger especially in the large college of atrophy of the 
spiritual nature, and the inability of the government uni- 
versity to meet the conditions for the best results from edu- 
cation. 

In the Cosmopolitan) October, 1895, Prof. Richard T. 
Ely of Wisconsin University made substantially the same 
concessions. According to these leaders the 'government 
must look to the church to remedy the fatal defects of the 
government schools which must be secular, and, by so much, 
fail to furnish the best environment and stimulus for the best 
education. Both of these gentlemen propose a modus vivendi 
and in this they agree. Both profess a kind of love for the 
Christian college, but Prof. Ely gives us to understand that 
it is because they are as big as they are, and intimates that, 
if he had been present at the time of their birth, successful 
accouchment would have been doubtful, and warns us against 
the further wicked waste of money on them, at least until 
there is no more missionary work to do. 

The modus vivendi proposed is this : leave the church 
school to take care of itself, it has our blessing, and organize 
Young Men's Christian Associations at the seat of the gov- 
ernment universities. Here send bright men to work among 
the students. Build halls and dormitories. "Family prayers 
could be held every morning, and religious services con- 



272 



THE SPHERE OF THE STATE 



ducted during the week as well as on Sunday." Pay your 
workers large salaries such as the regular professor in the 
university gets. It is specifically provided, however, that 
none of this work is to be considered university work, and 
all buildings shall be across the street from the university 
grounds. 

This modus vivendi fascinated me and while under this 
fascination I fell asleep and dreamed. This paper is too long 
to permit me to relate my experiences in detail. One thing 
so strangely moved me that I speak of it. I was in a city 
of exceeding architectural beauty, far surpassing the splen- 
dors of any of the nineteenth century. The sky was deep 
blue, but the atmosphere was exceeding cold, though the in- 
habitants did not seem to know it. The people all kept to one 
side of the street. I soon discovered the reason for this. 
Those who had dwelt in that city for any length of time had, 
by the long use of the left eye, developed a keenness of vision 
unknown in* any other city, but the power of vision in the 
right eye by long neglect was lost. I was also told that while 
these people for a short time had greater vision out of the 
left eye, they were compelled to use glasses at a much earlier 
age than common mortals and total blindness was common 
among the older people. These were called agnostics. An- 
other strange peculiarity I discovered. All the inhabitants 
who dwelt there were insensible on one side, though they 
knew not that they were blind in one eye or partially para- 
lyzed on one side. Walking down the main street and the 
only one much frequented, I fell in with a bright companion- 
able young man who informed me that he was entering the 
great University. As he was such an one as to win my heart, 
I followed him. We soon approached the University grounds 
whose landscape gardner was equal in genius and skill to the 
supervising architect of the city. At the entrance, on a splen- 
did granite shaft was engraven : "To the University," whose 
magnificent buildings already overshadowed us. I chanced to 



AS TO EDUCATION. 



273 



notice across the street some modest buildings, each of which 
bore an inscription, but as the inhabitants of the city passed 
not on that side of the street, I did not then understand the 
writings. We were soon with the throng in the lecture hall 
of the most celebrated lecturer, whose subject for the morn- 
ing was Life. With learning he discoursed, and with ingeni- 
ous apparatus applied to a calf's head, he illustrated as in the 
days of my natural life it was not possible. At the close of 
the lecture, a student, who had not been in the University 
long as was evident from the fact that he used both eyes and 
was not paralyzed on either side, lingered, and when but few 
remained, ventured, out of a desire to know the whole truth, 
to ask: "Professor, what bearing has the teaching of the 
hour upon religion ?" 

The simplicity and the manner of the guileless youth 
amazed the professor for a moment ; but after a slight pause, 
he readjusted the eye piece, for already the left eye had also 
begun to fail, and with blandness said : "Young man, did 
you notice that row of buildings across the way just before 
you entered the portals to the University? 'Yes, sir.' Well, 
apply there for your information. By agreement we do no 
experimenting as to the origin of religious microbes, although 
We have discovered the surest and quickest way of extermi- 
nating them, and, if you take my entire course of lectures, 
you will learn how not to develop them." 

Then I went and tried to translate the inscription on the 
modest buildings across the street. I could make but little 
out of them, when a sophomore passed by, and in answer to 
my question as to the strange writing he' said : "To the house 
of prayer." 

I stood there meditating on what it all meant and heard 
many say, "What a shame the state ever allowed those re- 
ligionists to buy property next to the University." The last 
word I remember hearing was the answer to that, which was 
something like this : "It does not matter much now, the 
species is about extinct." 



274 



THE SPHERE OF THE STATE 



If the modus vivendi proposed furnishes the only future 
opportunity for the church to contribute to the moralizing 
and Christianizing of education, the opportunity is slight in- 
deed. There is a broader education for youth than that 
which the government can give, if that is all the attention 
that can be given to drawing out the religious nature. As 
God is broader than man, or the universe, so the Christian 
education is broader than the merely secular. Education 
centered in God is more stable than that centered in man 
or the world, and no other will lead to the highest develop- 
ment or permanently endure. 



FETTERED LIVES; OR, PLEA OF THE DIS- 
COURAGED. 



By Rev. Theodore Kemp, 
Pastor of Grace Church, Jacksonville, III. 
"Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?" — John, I '.46. 

It sounds like a sneer. Is it not the first note in the 
chorus of ridicule and insult which is to greet the Christ from 
Bethsaida to Calvary? Later his townsmen would ask in 
ill-concealed scorn, "Is not this the carpenter's son?" and 
Jews in the temple at Jerusalem would question, "How 
knoweth this man letters, having never learned?" And when 
human hate had done its worst, and Jesus of Nazareth was 
dying on the cross, would not chief priests, scribes and elders 
still mock him saying, "If he be the King of Israel, let him 
now come down from the cross, and we will believe him ?" 

And so at first sight this question of Nathaniel seems a 
part of all the rest — the language of contempt. But let us 
see. Philip of Bethsaida had but that day met the Master. 
It was an epoch-making day for "him, and with generous, 
sympathetic, eager mind, convinced that Jesus was the 
Messiah, he gladly obeyed when the Master said, "Follow 
Me." His excess of joy at so wonderful a discovery, and 
his unselfish sympathy sent him to his friend Nathaniel, with 
the astounding message, "We have found him of whom 
Moses in the law, and the' prophets did write, Jesus of 
Nazareth, the son of Joseph." If these words had been ad- 
dressed to a proud, self-righteous Pharisee at Jerusalem, well 
might we expect the scornful query, "Can there any good 
thing come out of Nazareth?" 

275 



276 



FETTERED LIVES; OR, 



Galilee was the most despised province of Palestine and 
Nazareth was the most despised town of Galilee. Provincial- 
ism in speech, literature, and religious thought made the 
people of Galilee and Nazareth the laughing stock of cul- 
tured, aristocratic, tradition-loving Jerusalem. But Nathan- 
iel, the speaker in the text, was himself a Galilean. And 
while we may be sure he did not share with Judea in its con- 
tempt for Galilee and its people, he doubtless keenly felt the 
ridicule and insult heaped upon his province, and in his sur- 
prise and humility, sensible of the general contempt for 
Nazareth, stammered, "Can there any good thing come out 
of Nazareth?" Could it be possible that a son of Galilee 
should be so honored? Could it be that despised Nazareth 
should furnish the Messiah for cultured, proud Jerusalem 
and for the race that had waited so long? Questions like 
these vexed the mind of Nathaniel that day, until the Master 
himself appeared, and then with doubts dispelled he became 
an eager disciple of the Christ. 

Blind that day was Nathaniel to the Providence of God 
which was working near him. Seeing only the untoward 
condition of his province and the unenviable reputation of 
Nazareth, he saw no deliverance, no day-dawn of hope, no 
glory; and but for the glad message which Philip brought, 
and the call of Christ to discipleship, he would have remained 
unhonored, unknown on the pages of history. That was the 
day of his hope, the awakening of his life. 

He knew not that a Galilean was in training, who should 
stir all Israel, and conquer the world. He had not heard how 
this teacher as a lad of twelve, had surprised Jerusalem Rab- 
bis by his wisdom, and how in after years, Nathaniel himself 
should hear the people fresh from the teaching of this great- 
est Rabbi, exclaim "Never man spake like this man." 

Not only Nathaniel but all Israel were surprised that one 
with such wisdom and power should arise from such a place. 
History is ever teaching the world, and yet the world is never 



PLEA OF THE DISCOURAGED. 



277 



taught and -each age must learn for itself anew the lessons 
which each former age has learned — so slow is man to profit 
by the past. Israel should have known that greatness had 
often sprung from obscurity. 

Had not a shepherd lad, despised for his youth, been left 
in the field, when Samuel came to his father's house to 
anoint a king? And was not David called to lay down the 
shepherd's crook for the kingly scepter, and to abandon guid- 
ing sheep for the ruling of a nation? And did not the son 
of a slave woman spend forty years in the wilderness, before 
he became Israel's deliverer, and the greatest law-giver of the 
ages? And did not Elijah spend yfears in the tents of the 
Bedouin before he confronted Ahab in the palace, or con- 
founded Baal on the mountain? While Jeremiah spends quiet 
years in his home at Anathoth, or Amos among the sycamore 
groves at Tekoa, before the one as the prophet of tears, wept 
for the sins of his people, or the other beholding the idol 
calves of Bethel, arraigns a nation at the bar of God. 

Blessed are the desert, and the wilderness, sheepfolds, 
homes of poverty and drudgery which have nursed prophets, 
instructed leaders and trained kings for the enrichment of 
the world. The lowliest place, the most degraded village is 
ennobled and glorified for all time, which gives a great soul 
to the ages. 

Blessed then is Nazareth, which reared Jesus and gave 
him to the world. In giving Jesus to the race, Nazareth 
shares in his contributions to the centuries. 

"Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?" The 
after life and influence of Jesus is the answer. Scorned for 
her provincialism, Nazareth has imparted the broadest cul- 
ture to the race. Without schools she has founded great 
universities, and has given to the ages their greatest scholars 
and ablest thinkers. Without culture, she has taught many 
languages and created mighty literatures. Without skill in 
art she has filled galleries, churches and museums for cen- 



278 



FETTERED LIVES; OR, 



turies with the choicest products of the painter's brush and 
the sculptor's chisel. 

Without music she has inspired the Handels, Mozarts and 
Beethovens to write symphonies, create oratories, and has 
made all the Christian ages vocal with holy song. Without 
a knowledge of science she has prompted astronomer, geolo- 
gist, chemist and physicist in their discoveries, subjugated the 
elements and made man a Titan amidst nature's forces. With- 
out freedom, herself in bondage to Rome, she has made 
strong the patriot's arm on a hundred battle grounds of lib- 
erty; has struck the galling fetters from millions of bonds- 
men, gained magna chartas, written constitutions and bap- 
tized the race with liberty and hope. 

And lastly, Nazareth in her sorrow, spiritual blindness 
and sin in giving Jesus to the world, has given to the helpless 
strength, to the sorrowing a Comforter, to the desolate a 
friend, to the sinning a Savior, and is yet daily lifting through 
her glorified Son, all races of men out of their blindness, sor- 
row, despair and death into the waiting arms of God. Given 
a royal soul, it will triumph over every obstacle, lowly birth, 
a humble home, obscurity, opposition, and will ennoble and 
glorify everything it touches. 

So the stable at Bethlehem is grander than any palace 
of earth, and the manger there more glorious than cradle that 
has rocked infant kings. And so the Christ that triumphed 
over all, hath made Nazareth and Bethlehem so sacred, that 
pilgrims from all over the earth hath visited them as shrines, 
and even their poor ruins are today venerated still. 

But men fettered, hampered, discouraged today, ask 
if any good can come out of their Nazareth. In their pov- 
erty, loneliness, weakness, obscurity, trials — is there any 
hope? Yes, if like Jesus, they make their Nazareth, dis- 
cipline, training, inspiration to noblest living and the develop- 
ment of the most exalted character. 



PLEA OF THE DISCOURAGED. 



279 



The years spent by the Savior at Nazareth were not 
wasted, but were the most fruitful, perhaps, of all his life. 
Omit the discipline of those years, and the after life of 
teaching and miracle were impossible. Who shall compute 
the value of the home life with its lessons of obedience, the 
parental training, in love and reverence for the law of God ; 
where in the rude carpenter's shop he learned habits of in- 
dustry, and from the associations of the village, gained a 
knowledge of the sorrows and burdens of the poor, and of 
the perils of the rich; in quietness communed with nature 
in her varying moods, meditated upon the precepts of the law, 
or daily communed with the Heavenly Father'. If he was 
ever sensible of his poverty, or his limitations in his humble 
home, we are given no hint of it. But we know that in 
seclusion, he prepared for deathless renown ; within the limits 
of a village, he gathered wisdom to attract all lands and to 
teach all ages. 

You say, "God the Father aided Him ?" So will he you. 
Believe it, and thank God for the training days, that may 
issue in a glorious life. I am convinced that much of our feel- 
ing of limitation arises from not appreciating our oppor- 
tunities, from not using the means at hand for growth and 
power. 

Do you complain, that your talents are few, your gifts are 
small? Moses stammering and halting, when called to de- 
liver Israel, was asking God for a message and a sign. "Tell 
Pharaoh," said God, "that I am hath sent you." This was 
the authority. "What is that in thine hand ?" And the rod 
cast down by Moses became a serpent from which he fled. 
This was the sign. Is it not enough for us ? Go forth know- 
ing that "I am," the everliving God goes with you; and take 
the talent, the time, the opportunity that is yours and let God 
use them to make of you a leader, to triumph over fears 
and sin. 



280 



FETTERED U VES; OR, 



To .those who were faithful over a few things, the reward 
was promised — "I will make thee ruler over many things." 

Who can tell what may result from the faithful use of one 
talent, the right appreciation of even one opportunity? A 
grain of wheat will not appease the hunger of a starving man, 
and seems worthless, but sow it and it becomes the germ of a 
hundred harvests and makes bread for a thousand homes. 
An acorn counts for but little in itself but if it be planted in 
the earth, it may through the coming years grow into mighty 
forests, from which shall be builded splendid cities and pow- 
erful navies. 

John Stuart Mill, it is said, was one day thrown into a fit 
of melancholy, when he considered that all music must be 
produced from five tones and two semitones, and all combina- 
tions of these were not harmonious, therefore there must be 
a limit to melody. 

Oh, short sighted philosopher, could you not be happy in 
the thought that the possibilities of those seven tones were 
so great as to produce all the melody which the human ear 
could discern? For in those tones are the sweet notes of a 
mother's lullaby, the song of bird, the lover's plaint, the 
merry laughter of children, the music of murmuring brooks, 
the deep diapason of the sea, the symphonies and oratorios 
of all the masters of melody, with all the songs of faith and 
hope that assuage the grief, and swell the joys of man, and 
make accord with celestial choirs, endlessly chanting paeans 
in the ear of God. 

If insentient germs and tones are, under God, so blessed, 
to feed and house and elevate the race, what may not be 
the possibilities of the lowliest soul, reasoning, aspiring and 
deathless as Deity, under the training and upholding power 
of the Infinite God ! 

The silent forces of nature are the mightiest. "The 
granary is filled not by the thunderous forces that appeal to 
the eye and ear, but by the secret invisible agents ; the silent 



PLEA OF THE DISCOURAGED. 281 

energies, the mighty monarchs hidden in roots and in seeds. 
What rioting storms cannot do ; is done by the silent sap and 
sunshine." So the invisible tides of influence, that sweep 
outward from every truly 'good and earnest life, may travel 
all unnoted ten thousand miles and through the ages, sweet- 
ening lives, perfecting friendships, scattering darkness, 
bringing cheer and revealing Christ to unnumbered hosts. 
No act or word of a great heart nor an earnest, God-loving 
soul is lost. 

The puny strength of man, his feeble talents and his falt- 
ering faith, when linked with Almighty power, wisdom and 
love, will avail to give man deathless influence and undying 
renown. It is not a question of how many talents and ad- 
vantages are ours, but rather, shall God and humanity have 
the use of such as we .have ? 

The captive maid in Naaman's household seems destitute 
of opportunity for great deeds, but her earnest wish and fer- 
vent prayer saved her master from death, and on the Holy 
records she has undying renown. The lad with five barley 
loaves and two small fishes, doubtless looked helpless before 
the hungry multitude, but giving his little to Jesus, it was 
multiplied to feed to satiety five thousand men. 

Another says, "Poverty and adversity afford me no 
chance to live a splendid life or fulfil the dreams of youth, 
My life is full of drudgery." God has seen fit to put men to 
school through hardship that they might be trained in pa- 
tience, fortitude and perseverance. 

Manhood is developed through struggle and opposition, 
and through defeats as well as victories. It is of far more 
importance from the Divine standpoint to train the soul to 
grandeur, and manhood to its highest possibilities, than 
missing these, to be cradled in wealth and achieve short lived 
success. 

Some one has said, "All the fundamental qualities called 
patience, perseverance, courage, fidelity, are the gains of 



282 FETTERED IylVES; OR, 

drudgery. Greatness is through tasks that have become in- 
sipid and by duties that are irksome. The treadmill is a 
divine teacher." "After all," says Lowell, "the kind of world 
one carries about in one's self is the important thing,, and the 
world outside takes all its grace, color and value from that." 
He is a pauper in the eyes of God and angels who has naught 
but gold to commend him, and he has endless wealth, who 
though poor in purse has a pure heart, a generous mind, and 
is rich in faith toward God. 

Says Emerson, "I ought not to allow any man, because he 
has broad lands, to feel that he is rich in my presence. I ought 
to make him feel that I can do without his riches, that I can- 
not be bought ; neither by comfort, neither by pride, and al- 
though I be utterly penniless, and receiving bread from him, 
that he is the poor man beside me. I revere the person who 
is without riches ; so that I cannot think of him as alone, or 
poor, or exiled, or unhappy." 

The child of God is rich beyond the wealth of kings, 
for has not the inspired writer declared with a note of 
triumph, "All things are yours, whether Paul, or Apollos or 
Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, 
or things to come ; all are yours ; and ye are Christ's ; and 
• Christ's is God's." 

Well may the Christian joyfully sing: 

'A tent or a cottage why should I care, 
They are building a mansion for me over there, 
Though exiled from home, yet still I may sing, 
All glory to God, I'm the child of a King.' 

He who is rich in faith toward God and is filled with love 
for men, lives a glorious, regal life. He may live in a hut, 
but he has a mansion on high ; he may suffer loss but he is 
gaining unfading uncorruptible treasure in Heaven ; he suf- 
fers hardships, but it is that he may be a sharer in the 
Savior's triumphs ; he is often lonely, but angels keep him 
company ; his soul hungers, God's banquet table is spread be- 
fore him; he sorrows, but the great Burden Bearer wipes 



PIvEA of the discouraged. 



283 



away his tears ; he needs friendship, the, Son of God is by his 
side; he needs support and strength, and clasps hands with 
infinite power as he daily walks with God. 

Christ was so poor that he said, "The foxes have holes, 
and the birds of the air have nests, but the son of man hath 
no where to lay his head so poor that he must cross Gen- 
nesaret in a borrowed boat, perform a miracle to pay a penny 
tax, make his triumphal entry into Jerusalem on a borrowed 
colt, and be buried at last in a borrowed sepulchre. But he 
proved that poverty and hardships cannot crush a persever- 
ing spirit, and that true greatness is of the soul. 

Privation and discouragement have helped to make men 
great. History is filled with the story of men and women 
who have wrested victory and fame from the jaws of defeat, 
in face of hunger, cold and death. 

The poor deaf pauper Kitto making shoes in the alms- 
house, wrote in his journal : "I am not myself a believer in 
impossibilities, I think that every man may render himself 
almost anything he wishes to become," and in the spirit of 
that belief, became one of the world's greatest Biblical schol- 
ars. Inspiring, the story of the Irish lad, earning eight cents 
a day writing ballads, penniless at twenty-eight and living in 
the beggar's quarters in London, but later attracting the 
world with, "The Deserted Village," and "Vicar of Wake- 
field," — of the poor, scrofulous, half blind boy, who fought 
desperately with misfortune, to become the dean of English 
literature. Or read the story of Newton who fought with 
poverty while making his greatest discoveries ; of Elihu Bur- 
ritt the poor blacksmith, becoming a wonder of American 
learning ; of artists and poets who have starved in garrets or 
cellars, and scores in other pursuits have risen above it all, 
to fill the world with beauty and song, write philosophies, 
teach science, check disease, lead armies, guide nations or 
with eloquent speech incite men to nobler lives. 



284 



FETTERED LIVES; OR, 



The Nazareth of poverty and hardship for you may be the 
discipline to call forth your best powers and fit you for a 
wider influence, and the more abundant life. Thank God for 
opportunity and pluck, to turn poverty into a blessing, and 
stumbling blocks into stepping stones. 

Misfortune nor affliction have power to crush a deter- 
mined soul. Witness Walter Scott with one foot in the grave, 
fighting back death inch by inch, that he might pay his debts 
before he died, or the Harvard student who paralyzed and 
partially blind continues his studies in bed, graduates with his 
class, then learns German and Italian, critically studies Dante 
and wins the university prize, and makes a valuable contribu- 
tion to literature. Read the story of Disraeli, born of a hated 
race, fighting his way at every step amidst insults and hisses 
to become Prime Minister for a quarter of a century ; of Pres- 
cott and Parkman defying blindness and ill health to become 
the best of American historians ; of a Lincoln, without wealth, 
or education, gaunt, homely, awkward, ridiculed, slandered, 
displacing celebrated leaders to become president and eman- 
cipator and with a martyr's blood seal his right to deathless 
honor. Strikingly one has said, "Imprison a Galileo for his 
discoveries in science, and he will experiment with the straw 
in his cell. Deprive Euler of his eyesight and he but studies 
harder upon mental problems, thus developing marvelous 
powers of mathematical calculation. Lock up the poor Bed- 
ford tinker in jail, and he will write the finest allegory in the 
world, or leave his imperishable thoughts upon the walls of 
his cell. Burn the body of Wycliffe and throw the ashes into 
the Severn, but they will be swept to the ocean, which will 
carry them, permeated with his principles, to all lands." 

If poverty, obscurity, meager talents and misfortune 
should not discourage a person, neither should he be discour- 
aged by past failures. History and biography teach that men 
by repeated failures have come to splendid victories. 

A man is never master of himself until he is conscious of 
his defects, through his defeats. 



PtnA of The discouraged. 



235 



It is said to the honor of the American soldier that he 
never knows when he is defeated. Fresh from repeated re- 
pulses he will go forth to victory. 

This quality had Grant, and Washington in preeminent 
degree. Napoleon said of Massena, the great general, 
"When defeated, Massena was always ready to fight a battle 
over again, as though he had been the conqueror." 

Says Goldsmith : "Our greatest glory is not in never fall- 
ing, but in rising everytime we fall." 

"Nor deem the irrevocable past 
As wholly wasted, wholly vain, 
If, rising on its wrecks, at last 
To something nobler we attain." 

Is there not something God like in the power of intrepid 
souls to laugh at poverty, hardships, prison bars, suffering, 
loss of earthly goods, loss of friends, blindness, deafness, 
threats, repeated defeats, death itself and conquer gloriously 
in spite of all ? 

Surely the Christian, of all men, should triumph as he 
labors for God and is supported by His grace and power. 

An unsullied life of devotion to God outweighs all earthly 
honors. Because he is a child of God, his every word and 
deed possesses a new significance and his success or failure is 
watched zealously from Heaven, and he is hourly under the 
watchful care of the Heavenly Father. "All things work to- 
gether for good to thefn that love the Lord." 

There is tremendous force in that expression — "all 
things." Every force and principle in nature, the strength 
of angels, the accumulating might of the thoughts, words, 
deeds, martydoms of the righteous dead, the eternal plans and 
purposes of God, and the wisdom, power, and love of Christ, 
conspire to help and bless every trusting heart and sweep on 
to splendid, eternal triumph, every obedient soul. 

Encouraged and supported thus, the life of every child of 
God is a glorious success. For him the meanest hut with its 



FETTERED LIVES; OR, 



four bare walls, expands to the proportions of a palace ; the 
lowest task becomes glorified because done for Christ; the 
narrowest place, becomes a broad royal highway where Faith, 
Joy and Love may daily run on errands for the king and grow 
into the likeness of the Christ; the bed of pain becomes a 
place of joy supported by His grace, and the most sorrowful, 
desolate days become blessed, because of the comforting pres- 
ence of Him, who walked with the three Hebrew children in 
the fire; him, foes do not frighten who clasps hands with 
Infinite power ; and death he does not dread who realizes that 
"to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord." 

Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth? O 
doubting, discouraged soul you are of royal lineage, creeping 
when you should be running, walking when you should be 
"mounting up as on wings of an eagle." You have mourned 
your lot, while angels have envied you, and you should have 
shouted in triumph over your heritage. Open doors of 
blessed opportunity swing wide to invite you in. 

In redeeming you Christ has bid the outcast become the 
son ; given for the rags of sin the garment of righteousness, 
bread for your hunger, strength for weakness, and called you 
to lay down your doubts and fears, for faith, hope, assurance 
and the scepter of a widening empire. To you, as to faltering 
Israel, God's command is, "Go up and possess the land." 

Read the roll of heroes and martyrs in the eleventh chap- 
ter of Hebrews. Thank God and take courage. 

Follow the career of Paul, who laid aside worldy honors, 
friends, fame, fortune, and cast in his lot with the lowly 
followers of the despised Nazarene. Then see the faith, the 
courage, that triumphed over affliction, loss, persecution, 
scourgings, hate, famine, loneliness, prisons and could say, 
"our light afflictions which work out for us a far more ex- 
ceeding and eternal weight of glory;" and in fetters in a 
damp, darkened cell, deserted by friends and facing death at 
the hands of a Roman executioner, could write a letter of in- 



Pt%A OF THE BISCOURAGBD. 



28? 



spiration to dispirited Timothy and anticipate death with the 
joy as of a bride looking toward her wedding morn. 

"Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?" the 
world asks as it sees men in weakness in claiming alliance 
with God. 

May we so live, that men know that mightier than gold 
or kings or armies or earthly power or fame, is the life of the 
obedient child of God, which conquering sin, inspiring faith, 
hope, love and goodness, reminds men of Him who came out 
of Nazareth and assures for the humblest of us all, victory 
here and endless power and glory at God's right hand. 




POSSIBILITIES AND CERTAINTIES RESPECTING 
THE SALVATION OF THE RACE. 



By H. H. Oneal, D. D. 
First Church, Sheibyville, Illinois. 
Are there few that be saved? — Luke 13:23. 

Every man who has at heart, the highest welfare of his 
fellow men, must be profundly concerned as to their final 
destiny. We may feel a genuine interest in what is daily 
transpiring in the great world about us. The clown, with his 
cap and bells ; the juggler, by his arts and tricks ; the devotee 
of fashion, by his vain conceit and silly pride, may amuse us 
for an hour. The philosopher, by his deep research into the 
mystery of nature and life ; the hero, by his brilliant achieve- 
ments on the fields of war ; the ruler of a nation, by his skill 
in statecraft ; the orator, by the magic spell of his eloquence ; 
the artist, the teacher, the inventor^ the explorer, the poet, 
and a thousand others, whose deeds entitle them to the 
world's approval and applause, may hold us in rapt attention 
and command our admiration. Vast masses of nameless ones, 
whom we see and know; victims of improvidence, poverty, 
vice and misfortune; doomed to toil, suffering, obscurity 
and oblivion; may stir our strongest sympathy, and move 
us to the noblest philanthropy, and that is well. 

But deeper, higher, vaster in its solemn import than all 
else, is the question of destiny. See the mighty procession ! 
tribe after tribe, generation after generation, marching by; 
never ending, and never the same for two successive mo- 
ments. Where are they going ? What is to become of them 
in the far-reaching future? Each one of them is endowed 



RESPECTING THE SALVATION OF THE RACE. 289 

with a great nature. Fallen, it may be ; nay, fallen it is ; may 
it be restored ? The character of each one is tending toward 
a destiny of fixedness and permanence. Is there any guar- 
anty that it may be fixed in holiness and happiness, forever? 

This discourse is a confessedly inadequate attempt to set 
forth the Possibilities and Certainties Respecting the Salva- 
tion of the Race. 

I. The Possibilities: 

Two principal thoughts of Scripture teaching, bear 
strongly upon the subject: 

1. The terrible Judgment of Almighty God upon Sin. 

2. The vast possibilities for the race under the Gospel of 
Jesus Christ. 

i. In order to appreciate the full force of God's judg- 
ment upon sin, we ought to know what sin is, to Him. How 
does He regard it? How does he feel toward it? These 
questions oblige; us to inquire : What is sin ? 

The question is not what it is in its outward appearance, 
nor what it is in the external overt act. So far, one brief 
answer covers the whole ground : "Sin is the transgression 
of the Law." But what is it in itself, its essence, its animus? 
What is it as it lies back in the thoughts, impulses, affections 
and motives of the soul, before these have ripened into 
action ? 

No description of the turpitude of sin, however high- 
wrought, can be extravagant; no portrayal of its demerit 
can be overdrawn. Call it the life and soul of hell; call it 
the foul, scorching breath of devils ; call it anarchy, or high 
treason against God and the universe ; call it the concentrated 
essence of all malignity and bitterness and hatred toward the 
Divine Being and the Divine Government, and you have not 
put the matter too strongly. 

Sin would dethrone and degrade the Almighty. It would 
depopulate heaven of all its blessed inhabitants. It would 
subvert every gracious purpose of God. It would pervert 



290 



POSSIBILITIES AND CERTAINTIES 



every blessing he has bestowed upon his creatures and turn 
the blessing into an unutterable curse. 

God hates it with a divine and holy hatred. It is loath- 
some and inexpressibly odious in his sight. All the depths 
of his infinite being are stirred with indignation toward 
it. All the powers of his infinite nature are arrayed against 
it. He never can be reconciled with it, or even look upon it 
without abhorrence. The Scriptures are crowded with types, 
figures, illustrations and descriptions designed to set forth 
the utterly abhorrent quality of sin ? 

The most impassioned languages spoken by men have 
been exhausted in the effort to express the divine feeling 
toward it. And yet, you close the -sacred volume with the 
impression that the whole truth has not been told. Back of 
the merciless denunciations, the stern condemnations, the 
awful threatenings, there is in the Divine Mind a vast feeling 
toward sin that is not and cannot be expressed. We read of 
the "fierceness," "power," "indignation" and "fury" of his 
anger. Also of the "rage" of his wrath, and of "stirring up 
all his wrath." We read that men may "perish from the 
way" when "his anger is kindled but a little." What, then, 
may the unutterable woes of sin and sinners be, when all his 
"wrath is stirred up?" And as if all former expressions of 
the Divine attitude toward sin were but partial and incom- 
plete, we are told of one "great day of his wrath," in which 
the whole divine feeling should culminate in one final and 
tremendous doom. 

"The day- 
Will come, when sin shall fly 
Back to her native hell ; there sink eclipsed 
In penal darkness, where no star shall rise, 
Nor ever sunshine pierce the impervious gloom." 

This tremendous evil has fallen upon our race. It has 
invaded the domain and established itself in every high place 
of our nature. It has struck its roots down into the very soil 
and substance of the soul. It has pierced us through and 



RESPECTING THE SALVATION OF THE RACE. 291 

through with poisoned shaft. It has fastened its viperous 
fang upon each man, each woman, each child. Sin is unnat- 
ural to human nature. It is alien and foreign to us. It has 
been injected into humanity from without. It has no right of 
existence, much less of authority and dominion over human 
lives and destiny. No view of sin that we can possibly have 
relieves it from the aspect of an unspeakable curse. It 
makes a breach between God the Creator and man the 
creature. It degrades the soul of man. It is the source of 
all the misery and wretchedness of the world. It would 
poison every cup of joy we put to our lips. It would 
destroy every bright hope of the soul. It would stain and 
spoil every beautiful thing that God has made. 

It is easy to conceive what sin would do, if unrestrained, 
by what it is doing under the most powerful restraints. 

It has filled the world with war and bloodshed and sor- 
row and tears. It is now crowding prisons, almshouses, 
asylums and the slums of cities with its own sad wrecks of 
manhood and womanhood. This is the ammus of sin. It is 
the sum of all curses that weigh upon the world. 

We may not know definitely and distinctly what the 
future of sin shall be. We only know that, in the light of 
human experience and God's Word, the prospect is dark and 
dreadful. The final results are described in words and fig- 
ures which have graven themselves as vivid impressions 
upon the minds of men. 

Our sins are following us unseen with stealthy tread, 
gathering in ever increasing volume and strength, ready to 
crowd upon our stricken souls when death lets in upon us 
the chill light of eternity. "The wages of sin is death." "The 
soul that sinneth shall die." "By one man sin entered into 
the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all 
men, because all have sinned." 

Viewed from the point of God's holy indignation, listen- 
ing to his burning words of condemnation and judgment 



292 



POSSIBILITIES AND CERTAINTIES 



upon sin, no ray of hope, no possibility appears for the salva- 
tion of any of the race. 

"O heaven! have mercy on us whose souls are hastening 
To that abode from whence there's no returning ; 
Grant thy mercy and love with all their chastening ; 
O keep our souls from everlasting burning." 

2. So far, the outlook is indeed dark and hopeless ; but 
there is another point, from which may be seen the dawning 
of a great hope. Jesus Christ has opened vast and glorious 
possibilities for mankind. 

Let it be conceded that, notwithstanding the universal 
fact, and the dreadful ravages of sin, a few persons in human 
history have contrived in some way to become very good. 
They have lived lives and achieved characters of saintly 
beauty and purity. Xo doubt can exist that they, at least, 
will be saved. 

It is maintained herein, distinctly and emphatically, that 
any provision made for the salvation of a few of the best and 
purest of mankind must also be a provision for the salvation 
of the entire race. The power that saves the saintliest should 
be equal to the salvation of the unsaintliest. The grace that 
saves the little child should be able .to save the guilty wretch, 
hardened in crime, because inherently they are alike involved 
in the curse of sin. 

There are two distinct features of humanity which, if 
clearly understood, would enable us to see that a possible sal- 
vation for one must be an equally possible salvation for all : 

(1) Each single member of the race possesses one qual- 
ity which distinguishes and separates that one from humanity 
as a whole, and also from every other part of the whole. 
This quality we call individuality. It is the realm of personal 
conduct and personal accountability. 

(2) Each member of the race is endowed with another 
quality which he has in common with every other. This 
feature we have named Human Nature. There has not 



RESPECTING THE SALVATION OF THE RACE. 293 



been, there is not, there cannot be, but one human nature. 
Regardless of all conditions of heredity, of environment, of 
the accidents of birth, climate, color, nationality, language, 
education, culture, or character, without a single possible 
exception human nature is, in one and all, the same identical 
thing. 

These two qualities are essentially distinct and must be 
so considered in this argument. 

Our human nature identifies each of us with the race of 
mankind. Our individuality separates each of us from every 
other member of the race. Whatever affects human nature 
affects humanity as a whole. Whatever affects the individ- 
ual may not affect another of his kind. 

Adam was the first man, the federal head of the race of 
mankind. He contained in himself that entire human nature 
out of the generations of his individual posterity have been 
produced. 

When Adam sinned, it was not merely the sin of an indi- 
vidual man ; human nature was on trial and sinned in Para- 
dise. 

Human nature in Adam differs from human nature in his 
posterity only in this : his nature was created ; theirs is not 
created, but transmitted. 

His nature was created sinless; after it was created it 
became sinful ; after it became sinful it was transmitted. 
Human nature cannot be transmitted without taking with it 
all that belongs to it, but by the disobedience of the Head of 
the race, sin belongs to it ; hence sin goes along with human 
nature by the laws of transmission from father to son, and 
from generation to generation. No individual can be in the 
line of Adam's posterity without taking on human nature 
with sin in it; hence no child of humanity can be born 
sinless. 

Here, then, we have a two-fold view of sin : the sin of 
human nature and the sin of the individual. The latter 



294 



POSSIBILITIES AND CERTAINTIES 



grows out of the former. One is called original sin, the 
other actual sin. One pertains to our nature, for which we, 
as individuals, are not responsible ; the other belongs to our- 
selves, for which we are personally responsible. Any pro- 
posed remedy for sin, in order to meet the full necessities of 
the case, must be a remedy for the sin of mankind as a whole, 
and also for the sin of which each man is guilty in his own 
individual capacity. 

2. It has been the absorbing problem of the ages, How to 
get rid of sin. "How shall man be just with God?" was the 
passionate cry of humanity as far back as the days of Job. 
To this day it is the 

"Wail of the world, 
The ever repeated refrain of poetry, 
The underbeat of the deepest philosophy, 
The still, sad music of humanity." 

God's answer to that supreme question is Jesus Christ. 
The divine idea of interposition on behalf of mankind was 
faintly expressed in the Garden of Eden. It proceeded to 
unfold, through forty centuries of human history, centuries 
of promise and prophecy, of type and ceremony, of law and 
miracle, of organization and discipline, of gradual revelation 
and supernatural guidance, of long preparation and patient 
expectation — one purpose running like a golden thread 
through all the warp and woof of the ages, until at last the 
whole divine plan stood out, unfolded, fully matured, ready 
to be projected upon the world and proclaimed to all the 
ages as God's answer to the deep longings of humanity as 
to the whence and how of man's deliverance from sin. 

Surveying the work of Jesus Christ on its human side 
only, how can it be considered as anything else than a 
merely mechanical and arbitrary arrangement, by which the 
sacrifice of an innocent person is made for the guilty? And 
how can a righteous government approve such an arrange- 
ment? How can the sacrifice of one be a satisfaction for the 
sins of so many? How can any sacrifice inure to the bene- 
fit of those who lived ages before the sacrifice was macle? 



RESPECTING THE SALVATION OF THE RACE. 295 



These are not questions raised for the sake of curiosity. 
They do arise and are pressed strongly by those who deny the 
necessity for and the efficacy of the sacrificia,l work of Christ. 

No direct reply to these and related questions is here 
attempted. The reasonableness and sufficiency of Christ's 
sacrifice depends much upon who and what he is, and how 
he is related to those for whom his sacrifice is made. Recall 
now the distinction already drawn between the universal and 
individual nature of man, with this distinction in view ; study 
the humanity of Christ. 

The second of the Articles of Faith of our church de- 
clares : "The Son, who is the Word of the Father, took 
man's nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin. He suf- 
fered, was crucified * * * to be a sacrifice not only for 
original guilt, but also for the actual sins of men." Two 
statements of the first importance are here made : 

i. "The Son of God took man's nature," i. e. } human 
nature. Strong and solid are the scriptural foundations upon 
which this declaration rests. 

Mark you, however : he did not receive human nature by 
the law of transmission, as we have done ; had he so received 
it, his nature would have been sinful, as ours is. That fact 
alone would have disqualified him as a sacrifice for human 
sin. 

He received human nature by a special divine creation, as 
Adam did. He was "conceived by the Holy Ghost." Hav- 
ing so received our nature, viz., by creation, his nature was 
sinless, as was Adam's unless, like Adam, he should become 
sinful by his own act. And although he was assailed by all 
the powers of darkness, although tried by inconceivably 
greater temptations than Adam ever knew, yet he sinned not. 
Thank Heaven ! once in the history of the world human 
nature has triumphed over all the fell powers of evil ! 

Illustrations of the universal quality of Christ's human 
nature are here freely drawn from two sources, viz., Mr. 



290 



POSSIBILITIES AND CERTAINTIES 



Robertson and Canon Liddon. They unite in saying, in sub- 
stance : Jesus calls himself the Son of Man. He was the 
Son of Man. What does that mean ? He was not a Son of 
Man. He was not the Son of a Man. What then? "He 
was the Son of Humanity; the genuine offspring of the 
Race." 

He was the "Representative, the Ideal, the Pattern," the 
Aggregate Man. "There was nothing local, nothing tran- 
sient, nothing national or sectional in him to dwarf the pro- 
portions of his world-erribracing character. He is God's idea 
of man completed." "He was the archetypal man. Before 
him all distinctions of race, all intervals of ages, all types of 
civilization, vanish. Translate his words into what lan- 
guage you will, he might have been the offspring of the 
country where* that language is spoken. There is in him 
nothing peculiar to any particular age or clime. "He was 
not the Asiatic, not the European, not the Hebrew. He is 
not the type of the century in which he lived. He is not the 
mechanic, not the aristocrat ; he is the Man. He is the Child 
of every age and every nation. His is a world-wide life. 
His is a heart throbbing with the blood of the race. His 
ancestry is the collective myriads of mankind. Emphatically 
he is the Son of Man, the very sublimation of humanity." 
He came to be the end of an old and the beginning of a new 
humanity. 

He was the "vicarious" man. A vicar is an official sub- 
stitute, one who acts in the place of and for another. "A 
vicar's act is, therefore, virtually the act of the principal 
whom he represents. Our human nature is the principal, 
Jesus Christ is our vicar. What he does for humanity is 
done by humanity." When, therefore, you see him in his 
humiliation and sorrow, remember it is not merely an indi- 
vidual man who suffers. It is not simply Jesus of Naza- 
reth, son of the carpenter, who is transfixed and expires on 
yonder cross. It is the universal man. It is humanity, 



RESPECTING THE SALVATION OF THE RACE. 



297 



bearing in itself the weight of its own woe for sin and trans- 
gression. And now he dies. Who dies? The old human- 
ity. And now he rises from the dead. Who rises? The 
new humanity from which the curse has been lifted by the 
sacrifice on the cross. And now he ascends up on high. 
The eternal gates are lifted, 

"There first humanity triumphant, 
" Passed the crystal ports of light." 

Angels in glory greet him, saying : "Hail ! All hail ! thou 
first-born of a redeemed humanity!" It was a glad day in 
heaven, and a glad day for the earth. Take up the song, ye 
angels ! Tell it, ye ministers of his ! Let it echo round and 
round the world — humanity has triumphed over sin and 
death, and the race may be free ! 

2. Our Article of Faith declares further : "He took our 
nature, to be a sacrifice, not only for original guilt, but also 
for the actual sins of men." That is exactly what was 
needed, as we have already seen. On his human side, Jesus 
was qualified to be a sacrifice for human sin, by virtue of 
two striking peculiarities which inhered in him, viz. : first, 
sinlessness. He was both priest and victim. Under the 
law, the officiating priest must be officially pure, and the 
victim must be without spot or blemish. The offering of an 
impure sacrifice by impure hands would have been an un- 
speakable offence to God. He would have spurned from his 
presence both the priest and the sacrifice. Second, the uni- 
versality of his human nature. Christ is inherently related 
to the whole race. And not only related, but the human 
nature of all the ages actually resides in him. He is not 
merely the representative of human nature ; he is human 
nature embodied. He belongs not to one age or generation 
more than another. He "took the nature," not of those 
who came after him any more than those who lived before. 
He wrapped that nature about him ; in it he lived and tojled 
and suffered and died. He was the Son of Man while he 



298 POSSIBILITIES AND CERTAINTIES 

lived; the Son of Man when he died. In his resurrection 
and ascension, and as our accepted sacrifice and High Priest 
in heaven, he is still the Son of Man. 

Having considered the possibilities, let us inquire fur- 
ther : 

II. — What are the Certainties Respecting the Sal- 
vation of the Race? 

1. "Are there few that he saved?" Through the sacrifice 
of Jesus Christ, all men are saved, unconditionally, except 
such as are guilty of actual transgression, in their own indi- 
vidual capacity. There is now no guilt of original sin. The 
taint of sin is there. The roots of bitterness remain. The 
"bent of sinning" is in us ; but none can be finally lost on 
account of the sin of human nature. That death on the cross 
has obliterated the handwriting that was against us, and 
"taken it out of the way." One-third of the race die in 
irresponsible childhood, or are otherwise incapable of actual 
sin. These are all saved, without conditions. The blessed 
robe of Christ's righteousness covers them, so that the eye 
of the Holy One sees no guilt of sin upon them. 

2. "Are there few that be saved?" Under the gospel of 
Jesus, all men, though guilty of actual sin, are saved, condi- 
tionally ; and the conditions are such that all may be saved. 
When human souls meet the conditions, they get the new 
nature represented by the risen humanity of Christ. The 
new nature comes, not by transmission, for that is always 
sinful; but by a "new creation." They are "created anew in 
Christ Jesus." It is called "regeneration," a "new birth," 
"risen with Christ," passing "from death unto life," "the 
old man is put off," the new man, which "after God is 
created in righteousness and true holiness," is "put on." The 
Scriptures are rich in vigorous and forceful language de- 
signed to express not the transmission of the old, but the 
birth of a new spiritual nature. By the very terms of the 
Gospel, it is certain that all who receive the new nature and 
are steadfast therein will be saved. 



RESPECTING THE SALVATION OF THE RACE. 299 

3. "Are there few that be saved?" While it is certain 
that all who receive, and live in the recreating grace of 
Christ will be saved, it appears that many do not and will not 
meet the conditions of salvation. They live in actual sin. 
They do not repent. They do not accept Christ. They fill 
up the measure of their days and pass away in the old trans- 
mitted nature. Are there any certainties respecting their 
final destiny? If so, what? 

A sufficint reply to that inquiry may be gathered from 
Christ's immediate answer to the question of the text, verses 
24 — 30. It is asserted as an undeniable proposition, that, 
so far as man's agency is concerned, spiritual salvation and 
worldly success depend upon the same general laws. There 
is something supernatural in religion, but nothing unnatural, 
arbitrary or unusual. The same laws govern success in 
secular and spiritual things. 

Jesus was master of the art of teaching from the stand- 
point of man's daily, practical life. He understood perfectly 
the philosophy of life. In this case, as to the number of the 
saved, he drew the subject out from the region of mere 
abstraction and speculation and placed it where it could be 
seen in the clear light of a few plain principles of man's 
ordinary life. Some of these principles are : 

(1) In this world's affairs, nothing worthy of being 
called success is ever reached without strenuous effort. 
Those who make no effort do not succeed. Those who make 
no effort to be saved will not be saved. Therefore, "Strive," 
v. 20. Make effort. Put your heart, your will, your energy 
into the work of being saved. 

(2) In the struggle for the rewards of this world, the 
few succeed, the many fail. Men must not only make effort, 
but effort in the right way, having regard for the laws upon 
which success is made to depend. This is true in secular 
affairs ; true also of the soul's salvation. "Many I say unto 
you will seek to enter in and shall not be able," v. 24. 



300 



POSSIBILITIES AND CERTAINTIES 



(3) Much of the effort that men make in the ordinary 
affairs of life is wasted effort, because it is made too late — 
made after it has become impossible to comply with the 
conditions, and hence fail. Jesus made a very forcible 
application of this law of common life to the question of 
the text: "Are there few that be saved?" "When once the 
Master of the House is risen up and shut the door, and ye 
begin to stand without and to knock at the door, saying, 
Lord ! Lord ! open unto me, and he from within shall answer 
and say, I know you not, whence ye are," vs. 25-27. There 
is effort enough now ; but it is too late. The door is shut. 
"Ye cannot enter now." 

(4) "Are there few that be saved?" It is certain be- 
yond any question that whoever refuses, or neglects, or in 
any way fails to make the effort, or makes the effort in any 
other way than that which God has prescribed, or makes 
the effort too late, cannot be saved at all. Hence, "there 
shall be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth, when 
ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the 
prophets, in the Kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust 
out." v. 28. 

4. "Are there few that be saved?" In this world-saving 
work the divine ministry of the Holy Ghost must not be 
overlooked. Away back in the elder ages he was laboring 
with men. By the preaching of Noah, the voices of Provi- 
dence and the inner light of conscience, he was seeking to 
turn men from their sins. Later, the Psalmist was over- 
whelmed with the conviction of his universal presence. 

Our Lord himself promised the Spirit as an invisible, 
diffusive, universal, ever - abiding divine Agent, carrying 
on the ministry of salvation in the world. It is the 
distinctive office of the Holy Ghost to convince the 
world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. What 
means yon altar to the unknown God, erected amid the 
boundless superstitition of the Athenians? Paul himself 



RESPECTING THE SALVATION OF THE RACE. 301 



explains that they were worshiping, without knowing it, 
the true God. What means that groping amid the dense 
darkness of heathenism? They are "seekers after God," 
"feeling after him, if haply they may find him." 

The ministry of the Holy Ghost is age-long and world- 
wide. He is in perpetual contact with all souls, helping 
them to make the best use of the light they have. Seeking 
to prolong and extend the saving work of Christ. 

"Far as the curse is found." 

Only through the merit of Christ's sacrifice can the 
heathen, or any, reach the kingdom of heaven. We do not 
know, however, along what secret avenues the power and 
efficacy of the cross may reach the lost souls of men. Who 
will say there are no channels of mercy and grace save those 
known to us? "In every nation, he that feareth God and 
worketh rigditeousness is accepted of him." 

5. "Are there few that be saved?" No doubt many will' 
be lost. We dare not lower or in any way modify the con- 
ditions of salvation. Many will live in sin,* hardening their 
hearts against God more and more, repudiating from first 
to last their only Saviour, die as they lived, and miss heaven. 
Him rejected, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin. 
Still, let us indulge a large hope for our race. 

The Gospel is world-embracing. Without Christ there is 
no hope, even for the best man. With him there is hope, not 
only for the best, but the worst, and all the worst, yea, for 
all men. With him there are gracious and splendid possi- 
bilities. 

The Gospel is yet to spread to "earth's remotest bound." 
Faith and piety will yet become as .prevalent as sin has been. 
W e do not know how the power of Christ's sacrifice lays hold 
of humanity; we only know that sinful souls from far and 
near get drawn into the sphere where Christ's saving power 
works. 



302 



POSSIBILITIES AND CERTAINTIES 



The final consummation will be glorious. The vision of 
St. John in the Apocalypse swept all the fields of glory. All 
the inhabitants of heaven were present to his sight. All 
ages, all climes, all peoples, contribute to swell the host of 
the redeemed. "I beheld, and lo, a great multitude, which 
no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and peo- 
ple, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb." This 
rapturous vision is in keeping with the whole tenor of the 
Scriptures. "In my Father's house are many mansions." 
"The Captain of our salvation will bring many sons to 
glory." They shall come from the East, and from the West, 
and from the North, and from the South, and shall sit down 
in the kingdom of God." v. 29. 

I close this discourse with a splendid passage from mir 
own venerable and revered Bishop Foster. He says : "To 
my faith, one vision rises before me ; its essence I believe to 
be true. I see a soul growing in knowledge, in love, in holy 
endeavor. I see a vast community of souls : they seem to be 
moving along a pathway of light, of ever expanding excel- 
lence and glory ; brightening as they ascend ; becoming ever- 
more like the pattern of infinite perfection; loving with an 
ever deepening love ; glowing with an ever increasing fervor ; 
rejoicing in an ever advancing knowledge. They are all im- 
mortal. There are no failures or reverses to any of them. 
Ages fly away ; they soar on, with tireless wing. Aeons and 
cycles advance toward them and retire behind them ; still 
they soar and sing and shout and unfold. I am one of that 
immortal host. Death cannot destroy me. I shall live when 
stars grow dim with the advancing and retreating ages. As 
the vision rises, how this side dwindles into nothing. This 
globe is a mere speck ; time is only a moment ; all the glory 
and the pomp of the earth shrink up into the trinkets and 
baubles that amuse an infant for a day." 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 

E. K. CREWS, PH.B., A.M., PASTOR AT WINDSOR, ILL. 

"When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, he 
asked his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I, the Son of 
Man, am? And they said, Some say that thou art John the Bap- 
tist, some Elias, and others Jeremias, or one of the Prophets. He 
sayeth unto them, But whom say ye that I am? And Simon Peter 
answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. 
And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou Simon 
Bar-Jona ; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but 
my Father which is in heaven. And I say unto thee that thou art 
Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates 
of hell shall not prevail against it, and I will give unto thee the 
keys of the kingdom of heaven ; and whatsoever thou shalt bind 
on earth shall be bound in heaven ; and whatsoever thou shalt loose 
on earth shall be loosed in heaven." Matt. 16 : 13-19. 

Immediately after the miracle of the feeding of the four 
thousand men, besides women and children, with seven 
loaves and a few little fishes, upon the sloping hillside east 
of the Sea of Galilee, Jesus recognizing from the "signs of 
the times" and from the tightening meshes wrought by evil 
men that his ministry was drawing to a close, decides upon a 
peripatetic school of instruction designed for that charmed 
inner circle of the Twelve. Thus resolving, he turns from 
Jewry to the Gentiles for two reasons : First, he desires to get 
away from the spies who, acting under strict orders from 
the Jewish ecclesiastical court, the Sanhedrim have, like the 
sleuth hound, dogged his footsteps, challenged his author- 
ity, accused him of being in league with the devil, stirred up 
the rabble against him ; his ministry from Cana to Calvary 
was beset with snares, enemies and foes determined that 
Christ must die. From these, for a brief period, he would 



303 



304 PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 

get away. Second, he desires to instruct the disciples in 
some deeper and diviner truths than hitherto had been 
revealed. 

Recrossing the sea of Galilee in a ship to Magdala, the 
first words recorded as spoken to him were the words of the 
Pharisees and Sadducees, conjointly spoken, as though by a 
previous arrangement, tempting Christ and asking for a 
sign. Jesus uttered one of those scathing rebukes he knew 
how to administer at the proper time — which upon more 
than one occasion had discomfited his tormentors — saying, 
"O ye hypocrites, ye can discern the face of the sky, but ye 
cannot discern the signs of the times." How awfully, ter- 
ribly and tremendously true ! The scepter had departed from 
Judah ; the lawgiver from between his feet ; the forerunner 
had arrived and fulfilled his mission and passed away, and 
yet they would not believe "Shiloh had come." Is it any 
wonder that Jesus concluded his figure of speech by saying, 
"A wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign; 
and there shall no sign be given unto it but the sign of the 
prophet Jonas." There is a world of meaning in the next 
six words, "And he left them and departed." Turning away, 
Je'sus journeyed northward, and in journeying delivered that 
homely parable of the leaven, so true a picture of the lack 
of spiritual energy in that day. The "beware" of Pharisaic 
formalism and Sadducean rationalism is echoing out from 
Galilee, and the warning peal is touching all waters, all lands 
and all created beings. Reaching Bethsaida, a blind man is 
brought to Christ ; his compassionate soul ever responsive to 
misery's cry, he heals him. 

Leaving Bethsaida, Jesus and the disciples journey north- 
ward. O the joy of that journey with the Saviour! They 
have left us no record of any events or conversations on the 
way between Bethsaida and Caesarea Philippi ; but we can 
see as we look down into our own hearts what questions 
we ask and then, perhaps, get a glimpse of what occurred on 
the way. * 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



305 



Perhaps Pope in his poem, "The Universal Prayer," has 
expressed the conversations of the twelve and Jesus : 

Father of all ; in every age, 

In every clime adored, 
By saint, by savage, and by sage, 

Jehovah, Jove, or Lord ! 

Thou great First Cause, least understood, 

Who all my sense confined, 
To know but this, That thou art good, 

And that myself am blind. 

Yet gave me in this dark estate 

To see the good from ill ; 
And binding nature fast in fate, 

Left free the human will. 

What Conscience dictates to be done 

Or warns me not to do, 
This teach me more than hell to shun, 

That more than heaven pursue. 

What blessings thy free bounty gives, 

Let me not cast away ; 
For God is paid when man receives, — 

To enjoy is to obey. 

Yet not to earth's contracted span 

Thy goodness let me bound, 
Or think thee Lord alone of man, 

When thousand worlds are round. 

Let not this weak, unknowing hand, 

Presume thy bolts to throw, 
And deal damnation round the land 

On each I judge thy foe. 

If I am right, thy grace impart, 

Still in the right to stay ; 
If I am wrong, oh teach my heart 

To find that better way. 



306 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



Save me alike from foolish pride, 

Or impious discontent, 
At aught thy wisdom has denied, 

Or aught thy goodness lent. 

Teach me to feel another's woe, 

To hide the fault I see, 
That mercy I to others show, 

That mercy show to me. 

Mean though I am, not wholly so, 
Since quickened by thy breath ; 

Oh lead whereso'er I go, 
Through this day's life or death ! 

This day, be bread and peace my lot ; 

All else beneath the sun, 
Thou knowest if best bestowed or not, 

And let thy will be done. 

To thee whose temple is all space, 
Whose altar, earth, sea, skies ; 

One chorus let all being raise, 
All nature's incense rise. 



In fleeing from his tormentors Jesus has passed through 
Judea, Samaria and Galilee. Caesarea Philippi is 120 miles 
north of Jerusalem. Just beyond the city towers Mount 
Hermon, 9,500 feet high, whose eternally snow-crowned sum- 
mit, kissing the clouds, folds in its cold storage the reserve 
that shall be unlocked by summer suns and feed the Jordan 
between the "early and the latter rain." Mount Hermon 
has aptly been termed "the Mount Blanc of Palestine." Just 
south of Mount Hermon, and nestling at its base like a toy 
city in a giant's hand, was Caesarea Philippi, the objective 
point of Christ. 

The ancient name of Caesarea Philippi was Panium. In 
the rear of the town, at the mountain's base, was a cave 
dedicated to the Greek sylvan god Pan — god of woods, 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



807 



plains, hunting and fishing. Especially did the Grecians be- 
lieve he watched over the pasture fields. It is to this that 
Milton refers in the "Hymn of the Nativity" : 

"The shepherds on the lawn, or o'er the point of dawn 
Sat simply chatting in a rustic row ; 
Full little thought they then, that the mighty Pan, 
Was kindly come to live with them below ; 
Perhaps their lives, or else their sheep, 
Was all that did their silly thoughts so busy keep." 

He is represented as a bearded man with a large, hooked 
nose, with ears, horns, legs and feet of a goat; his body is 
covered with hair; he has a shepherd's musical syrinx of 
seven reeds, and a shepherd's crook. 

It will be remembered by the student of history thai 
Alexander conquered Asia Minor, Syria, Phoenicia and 
Palestine, 332 and 331 B. C. At his death, in 330 B. C, his 
empire was divided among his generals. Syria fell to 
Seleucus ; and at that time it included Judea, Samaria, and 
Galilee. I speak of this to show or make plain how so many 
towns mentioned in the New Testament bore Greek names, 
or were named after Greek divinities. 

When the Romans came into possession of Asia Minor, 
Syria, and Palestine, Antipater, an Idumean, was appointed 
ruler of Judea, and his son Herod, known in history as 
Herod the Great, was ruler of Galilee. He it was who 
enlarged Panium, and built a temple to Augustus, and when 
Philip the Tetrarch, son of Herod the Great, became ruler, 
he remodeled the town and gave it the name of Caesarea, and, 
to distinguish it from the town already built on the Mediter- 
ranean and called by the same name, he added his own name 
Philip ; hence we have the Biblical name Caesarea Philippi. 
The town is 1,147 feet above the sea, nestling amid three 
valleys of luxuriant growth. Everywhere are wild cascades 
and dashing torrents — the beginnings of the River Jordan, 
whose waters, had baptized that "generation of vipers" as 



308 



PETER'S GR£AT CONFESSION. 



well as the ''Son of God" in John the Baptist's day. This 
little Paradise Avas festooned with vines and shaded by fig, 
mulberry and olive trees. Here in this garden spot of Gali- 
lee's northern border (both Pagan and heathen in belief, 
manners and customs), Christ's question to his disciples 
becomes a rod of Moses to the heart of Peter, causing to 
gush forth the living, vivifying, life-giving, soul-saving, 
heart-rejoicing, heaven-born confession of Peter, "Thou art 
the Christ." How paradoxical it seems — a god wandering 
from his city, his temple, his priests, his altars, his sacri- 
fices, and stopping in a heathen city whose inhabitants wor- 
ship a Greek mythical divinity. Far behind him is his birth- 
place, his early home, but he is beyond the boundaries of 
David's domain, before the altars of Pan, asking the ques- 
tion, "Whom do men say that I the Son of Man am?" 

What does it show ? It shows that he came unto his own 
and his own received him not. Oh, ye scribes, Pharisees, 
Sadducees, priests and hypocrites ! Dog the footsteps of the 
Master out of Jewry if you will ! He has turned to us and 
become a light to lighten the Gentiles. Ah yes ! lay hold of 
the Rose of Sharon, promised in Eden's suburbs, planted in 
Bethlehem and manifested in Jerusalem. Lay hold with 
strong hands of hate, tear it up by the roots, lift it high on 
Calvary, in your rage and fury flagellate his back until it is 
seamed and scarred like a hoary mountain side; press the 
thorned coronet heavily upon his defenseless head, pierce 
him with nails, spears and scoffs ; shake him in your insane 
madness, bury him deep in Joseph's tomb, seal it with the 
king's seal, surround with a wall of the bravest imperial 
guards ; you are but undermining your own house, building 
your own funeral pyre, while the life-giving principle is 
wafted on every breeze and borne upon the downy breast of 
the Holy Pneumatos until the seeds have lodged in every 
soil, every shore and every clime ; until the waste places are 
being built up, the desert fruitful and blossoming with this 
same Rose. 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



309 



The question of Jesus reveals a human yearning to be 
understood and loved, and a divine yearning for true con- 
fession and faith. This is not a time for mistakes. Christ 
has come to redeem, save, re-create and restore the lost image 
of God in lost souls. His is a gigantic task. When a con- 
dition of mentality or life is to be attained which admits of 
no change, no variableness, nor shadow of turning, a position 
where all error and false premises are swept away by posi- 
tive and unalloyed truth, it is essential that what is taught 
and believed is free from error and human limitations and 
weaknesses ; hence his is a herculean task. His campaign 
will be no mere holiday or summer outing, but one long, 
hard, earnest, persistent and, best of all, successful campaign 
in the end. All enemies must be put under his feet, and the 
last enemy to be destroyed is death, the result of sin. Out 
from ocean's deep caverns dark with mysteriousness, from 
yonder battlefields dotted with wounded marked "Un- 
known," from pyramid and funeral pyre, from the mauso- 
leum of Artemisia, from the Taj Mahal erected by Shah 
Jehon at Agra, from cemetery and crematory, all shall un- 
clasp their selfish fingers and give up their dead. 

Jesus is within five months of the crucifixion. There is 
no danger of molestation here. Step by step, with cautious 
analysis the grounds of the teachings of Jesus and the 
knowledge and belief of the disciples must be rehearsed. If 
he is to conquer the world he must have laborers who have 
reached the truth as it is in Christ Jesus, and, like David, be 
able to say, "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light 
unto my path." They must be ever ready to "give a reason 
for the hope that is within them," and be able with Paul to 
say, in the midst of heathenism, error, false teaching, false 
doctrine, skeptical tendency, and persecution, "None of these 
things move me"; "I know in whom I have believed." All 
dross and false notions must be removed ; if they are to teach 
they must have a theology that synods, councils and schools 



310 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



cannot take from nor add to ; the mysteries of Osiris and Isis 
must be exposed; the oriental Confucian, Brahmitic and 
Zoroastrianism must be overthrown; Pantheism, Material- 
ism and Rationalism must be destroyed; his religion must 
encounter a Madame Blavatsky with her School of The- 
osophy, with its spiritualistic tendency ; a Henrik Ibsen with 
his mysticism is to be thwarted, because his teaching dis- 
solves the marriage-tie and love is but a dream. Against 
all these must be revelation, divinity speaking in and through 
humanity, man's Redeemer, Saviour and Elder Brother. 

Now is the time to formulate their creed, hence the ques- 
tion is asked the disciples as a body, "Whom do men say that 
I, the Son of Man, am ?" There had been and was much dis- 
cussion among the Jews as to who Jesus was ; Jesus knew it ; 
hence they answered, "Some say thou art John the Baptist" 
(whom Herod had beheaded in the rock-hewn fortress of 
Mecharus). "Others say thou art Elias" ; others say thou 
art "Jeremias," or some other "prophet." There is a tre- 
mendous significance in the emphasized question of Jesus 
as he turned from the opinions of the multitude to the opinion 
of the disciples. A question involving so much, so closely 
related to our present condition in the Christian faith and 
of future bliss or woe, must be clearly and definitely settled 
once for all. The multitude did not believe in Christ's 
miraculous conception and birth; they reasoned thus, "Is 
not this the carpenter's son? Is not his mother Mary, and 
his brethren James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas?" 
(Matt. 13:55.) One may be comforted, though all the 
world turns against them, if their household and immediate 
relatives believe in them and their mission. Kadijah, the 
wife of Mohammed, was his first convert to the Islam faith ; 
but (John 7:5) his four brothers did not believe in him. 
How must Jesus have felt ? How utterly lonely and heavy- 
hearted! Therefore with greater meaning to us the ques- 
tion, "But whom say ye that I am?" comes after under- 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



311 



standing his discouragements, his heart hungerings and 
yearnings for the success of his cause. 

St. Chrysostom, the golden - mouthed bishop of Con- 
stantinople in the fourth century, A. D., says Peter was the 
"mouth of the Apostles." We feel sure that St. Paul (Rom. 
10:10) reverts to Peter's confession when he says, ''With 
the heart man believeth unto righteousness, and with the 
mouth confession is made unto salvation." Since the multi- 
tude were divided as to the personality of Jesus, and since 
his own brethren did not believe in his claim to being divine, 
Jesus asks the question, "But whom say ye that I am?" 
Peter said, "Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God." 
In the gladness of his heart Jesus cried out, "Blessed art 
thou Simon Bar Jona, for flesh and blood hath not revealed 
it unto thee, but my Father in Heaven." The astronomer 
turns his telescope to the sky; worlds, systems, and system 
upon system troop through the sky in stately and majestic 
tranquillity like the tramp of far-away armies keeping step 
to martial music and guided by skillful officers. The physical 
eye, unaided, cannot see these beauties. Likewise, the spirit- 
ual things of God are not revealed to agnostic, atheist or 
skeptic. Not even are they revealed to the "doubter" of 
"little faith." Only the telescope of faith beholds them, and 
the soul cries out, "Enough, my Lord and my God !" 

Peter's great confession is more wonderful because for 
three years he has beheld the poverty of Jesus, his homeless- 
ness, his enemies, his wanderings, his hunger, and his 
humanity. 

Again, if Peter believed Christ was the Son of God, he 
must publicly and openly avow the fact. Martin Luther 
was offered a cardinal's hat if he would quit preaching jus- 
tification from sin by faith in Jesus Christ. He replied, "If 
you will make me a pope I will not be guilty of cowardly 
silence toward my Lord and Master." 

Suppose a young man studies law or medicine, graduates, 
and says, "I am going to practice law, or medicine," but he 



312 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



has no office, hangs out no sign, seeks no customers; soon 
he would be on the charity of the county. 

Or suppose the eye should say, "I won't see ; I won't let 
the light into my brain." Soon the optic nerve would be 
paralyzed through disuse. God has no silent partners. David 
says, "Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord." 

For ages men dreamed of purity, of happiness, of Para- 
dise, and knew not where to find it. Plato's plan in the 
"Ideal Commonwealth" was to kill all the weak, abandon the 
helpless and ostracize the poor; thus idealize society by cul- 
ture and selection. 

Moore in his "Utopia" would deal with all criminals 
according to law and compel men to right lives without 
reformation or regeneration. Alas ! the failure. If this old 
world is to be lifted Godward and heavenward, no archime- 
dean force of Idealism will ever raise humanity one inch in 
righteousness, no hydraulic pressure of Humanism will re- 
form the masses and weld the classes ; no Heracles of ancient 
myth can cleanse the Augean stables of sinful hearts ; no 
Bellamy, dreaming of "Looking Backward," can transform 
society, transmogrify the life, or transfix the soul with the 
divine image of God. Isaac Watts in his poem on "Original 
Sin" says : 

"Behold we fall before thy face ; 
Our only refuge is thy grace, 
No outward forms can make us clean ; 
The leprosy lies deep within. 

Nor bleeding bird nor bleeding beast, 
Nor hyssop branch, nor sprinkling priests, 
Nor running brook, nor flood nor sea 
Can wash the dismal stain away. 

Jesus, thy blood, thy blood alone, 
Hath power sufficient to atone ; 
Thy blood can make us white as snow ; 
N,o Jewish types could cleanse us so, 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 313 

Only he who can regenerate both heart and life, who is 
the Christ the Son of the Living God, can take away the sin 
of the world, cleanse the human soul and rebreathe into him 
the lost light and image. 

It has been a query to many why Christ used the phrase- 
ology he did in commending Peter. It has been a source of 
error to many ever since the organization of the church : 
''And I say unto thee that thou art Peter, and upon this rock 
I will build my church." Let us not forget that there were 
five classes of opinions held as to who Jesus was. If any 
were true, only one could be true. 

First, some said Christ was John the Baptist. 

Second, some said Christ was Elias. 

Third, some said Christ was Jeremias. 

Fourth, some said Christ was one of the Prophets. 

Fifth, Peter said, "Thou art Christ the Son of the Living 
God." 

Since Christ only commended Peter for his belief, the 
other four views were wrong; their conclusions were erro- 
neous, the material in their building spurious and the foun- 
dation crumbling into uncertainty. 

Trouble arises in the interpretation of Christ's wording. 
Willfully or ignorantly some have said Christ was to build his 
church on Peter. Carefully let us examine the ground and 
determine whether this view is tenable or not. In John I 142 
Andrew brought his brother Simon to Jesus. Jesus looked 
upon him and said, "Thou art Simon, son of Jona (or Bar- 
jona) ; thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpreta- 
tion a stone." Read now the text, "Thou art Peter, and upon 
this rock I will build my church." Still we may be in doubt. 
The matter may not be clear. May not the "stone" which 
Jesus said Peter was, be identical with "rock" in Matthew? 
We turn to Liddell and Scott's Greek lexicon and find 
"Petros," the word Jesus used for Peter, which means a 
stone that can be handled, thrown,, carried or used for build- 



314 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



ing. The word "Petra," the word in the text in Matthew, 
is an immovable rock; hence Jesus did not mean that the 
church should be built on a movable petros, but upon an 
immovable petra. Then let us see what is immovable. The 
disciples are all dead ; Christ is ascended into heaven ; there- 
fore the church was not to be built upon the disciples, upon 
Peter, or upon Christ, but it was to be built upon the faith in 
Christ as expressed so grandly by Peter. The church is to 
be built on Truth, hence the confession of Peter is so aptly 
termed "The Great Confession." 

This "petra" of truth, believed in and uttered, is the 
sheet anchor of all believers who are enlightened by the 
preached word, regenerated by power divine and the Witness- 
ing Spirit. Upon this truth would Christ build his church. 
"Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my word shall not 
pass away." And the "gates of hell shall not prevail 
against it." 

The phrase "gates of hell" is a metaphor. In many in- 
stances this word gate is put for the town itself, as in Gen. 
22:17, Ruth 4:10. In Psalms 118:19, David speaks of the 
"gates of righteousness," meaning the Temple. In Job 
38:17, Job speaks of the "gates of death and hell," meaning 
death and hell. In Virgil's "Aenid," book 6, he speaks of 
"infernal gates." Thus we see that the expression "The gates 
of hell shall not prevail against it," means all aggressions and 
efforts made against the Christian church by the infernal 
city or empire or power shall not prevail against it. 

Again, this expression might have been used because of 
Ihe following custom : All ancient cities were walled. If an 
.army came against it and sought to take the city, they came 
with movable towers, having draw-bridges or gates, which 
could be let down on top of the wall for the enemy to pass 
over the gate into the city. Referring to this custom, Jesus 
used the illustration to show that the church would have 
enemies who would seek to overthrow it, but who should 
not prevail against it. 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



315 



Let us notice some of these enemies or gates to which 
Christ alluded. In Christ's day formalism was an enemy 
of the church. Prescribed forms, ceremonies, ablutions, 
prayers and rituals were the bane of the church. Christ 
described them by saying (Matt. 23 123-25), "Woe unto you, 
scribes, and Pharisees, hypocrites, for ye pay tithe of mint 
and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier mat- 
ters of the law, judgment, mercy and faith ; these ought ye to 
have done and not to leave the other undone. Ye blind 
guides which strain at a gnat and swallow a camel, woe unto 
you scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites, for ye make clean the 
outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full 
of extortion and excess." The disciples had to combat this, 
besides ignorance, doubt and superstition. But the gate of 
hell opposed to the church, beginning with Stephen's death 
was persecution. In three centuries ten thousand saints died 
of wounds, fire, sword, wild beasts and every conceivable 
torment a hellish imagination could invent. Night after 
night the human holocaust illuminated the gardens, palaces, 
parks and courts. 

Seeing this opposition availed but to make converts, Satan 
devised the gate of heresy. In the first century were the 
Simoniams, who taught that Holy Spirit and church honors 
could be bought; the Cerinthians, who sought to combine 
Judaism and Gnosticism with Christianity; the Ebionites, 
who denied Christ's divinity. 

In the second century were the Gnostics, who endeavored 
to weave Oriental and Greek philosophy into the teachings 
of Christ. If this had succeeded we should have had 
Samaritan worship or a Mohammedan Koran; the Mon- 
tamsti perverted the doctrine of redemption and held that the 
millennium had come on the day of Pentecost; the Allogians 
denied John's Gospel and Revelation because they denied 
that Christ was the Lord, which John affirmed ; the Angelics 
taught that Christ was not equal to the Father, but that he 
was a created angel. 



316 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



In the third century were the Novations, who taught that 
backsliders could not be reclaimed; the Origenseans taught 
that all beings — even Satan — would finally be saved. 

In the fourth century were the Avians, who held that 
Christ was inferior to God ; the Anthropomorphitcs preached 
that God had a human form. 

In the fifth century the Pelagians denied hereditary sin 
and salvation by grace ; the Nestorians held that Christ could 
not be both human and divine; the Theo PascJutes argued 
that God, Christ, and the Holy Ghost all suffered death on 
the cross. 

In the sixth century were the Predestrinarians, who are 
still having trouble. We have but touched a few of the 
numberless heresies whose influence, widespread and far- 
reaching, like octopean arms, embraced the church and 
endeavored to sap the spiritual life-blood from the bride that 
was to shine more glorious than the sun. In Victor Hugo's 
"Toilers of the Sea" we read of a horrible battle in a dark 
cavern between Gilliat and a devilfish. Our blood is chilled 
as we read the combat. So, Satan with his arms of heresy, 
atheism, skepticism, idolatry, higher criticism (falsely called) 
— perhaps we should say destructive criticism — these and 
all the enginery that hate, malignity and spite could invent 
have opposed Christianity. But it has survived the shock 
of persecution. It lives. Its life is victorious. It shall con- 
quer. 

Amid these heresies and heretical times of the first three 
centuries of our era a light dawns. In 325 A. D. Constantine, 
who had professed the Christian religion, called a council of 
the leading church dignitaries to convene at Nice. Here was 
formulated the Nicene Creed, which in the sixth century, 
with a few modifications, was generally adopted, and is used 
today as the "Apostles' Creed." "I believe in God the Father, 
maker of heaven and earth, and in Jesus Christ his Son, our 
Lord." Thus the great confession of Peter is interwoven in 
the Apostles' Creed and adopted in the ritual of the church. 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. W 

In the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries the greed for 
wealth dnd ritualism became the gates of hell. Pageantry, 
cardinals' hats and display engrossed men's thoughts and 
worship. The result was indulgences were made and sold 
by men for the forgiveness of sin and crime ; the church was 
one enormous bliStef or carbuncle, covered with wounds and 
bruises and putrefying sores, until God raised up Luther, 
Zwingli, Melancthon, Calvin and Cranmer, who, in Ger- 
many, France, Switzerland, and England, preached that 
religion was an inward principle, inwrought by the Spirit of 
God. Instantly church and state, palace and cottage, pope, 
bishop, priest, communicant, Catholic and Protestant entered 
the arena of discussion. Threats, menace, fire, sword, dun- 
geon and excommunication could not check the mighty rock 
of truth that had loosened from its Appenine center and 
swept avalanche-like until Germany, Norway, Sweden, Hol- 
land, Russia, Greece, England, France and Denmark came 
into religious liberty and independence and the church of 
God was saved. 

In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries indifference 
and pleasure were about to prevail against the church. "The 
whole church in England," says Green, the historian, and 
Tyreman, the biographer of the Wesleys, "was one mad, 
hilarious holiday of gaming, dancing, drinking and Sabbath 
desecration." What now will become of the church? 

God who cannot lie had given his word that the gates of 
hell should not prevail against it. It was at this darkest hour, 
and at the lowest spiritual ebb, that the Oxford Club was 
formed, whose aim and end was the spread of scriptural 
holiness in all the earth. A pebble thrown into a pond will 
create ripples that will spread in equal directions to every 
part of the shore. So the influence of that God-ordained band 
of Oxford students has spread until every orthodox, evan- 
gelical church has felt the influence of spiritual life and 
power from them, in ritual, in song, in pulpit power. 



318 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



Rationalists in Germany marshaled their forces and 
sought to explain the miracles on natural grounds. They 
were met by Lange, Ebrard, Elicott and Presseuse and were 
defeated. 

Again Higher Critics attacked the Pentateuch, saying 
science and revelation could not agree. Dawson, Guyat and 
Dana met the argument and destroyed their house of reeds 
and men of straw. Then they denied the authenticity of 
the Gospels. Bengel, Stier, and Alford — giants of ortho- 
doxy — rallied and saved the drifting ark. 

Infidelity of the Rationalistic and Higher Critic school, 
braggadocio of the Voltaire, sneering-Paine and jesting- 
Ingersol type — let these hurl intellect, railery, buffoonery 
and waggery at Calvary; it stands ; the old time religion was 
good enough for martyrs, for reformers, for fathers and 
mothers. It is good enough for us. 

The Old Testament, with its types, shadows, prophesies, 
and the New Testament, with its fulfillment, are the keys 
which Christ gave Peter, to all the disciples and to us. 
What a privilege to have and to hold this thesaurus of 
divine truth — the keys of heaven and hell in our own keeping. 
Believe and be saved. Doubt and be damned. 

What a privilege to unlock the sealed tomb and roll 
away the stone from some dead heart — dead in trespasses and 
in sins ! To unlock the kingdoms of China, India, Africa, 
Asia, and the islands of the seas, and let the light into the 
dark continents of the earth! To bring to the drunkard 
deliverance, sight to the blind, feed the hungry, clothe the 
naked, console the sorrowing, and bind up the broken- 
hearted ! 

There are those who, Jehoaikim-like, have been bitter 
against these keys, and who have sought to destroy them 
with the penknife of adverse criticism, but the dismembered 
parts have come together again, as if by an enchanter's wand. 
There have been those who have consigned them to the 



PETER'S GREAT CONFESSION. 



flames, but Phoenix-like, they have arisen from the ashes 
with a renewed youthfulness. There have been those who 
have prophesied they would be buried in forgetfulness ; but 
their hands, tongues and intellects are stilled and silenced, 
and their memory dropped in oblivion. The Word of our 
God endureth forever. 

Satan has sown disease, discord and sorrow ; has created 
war and persecution; sought to undermine our faith, but 
millions have sung and will sing with Timothy Dwight 

I love thy kingdom, Lord, 
The house of thine abode, 
The church our blest Redeemer saved 
With his own precious blood. 

I love thy church, O God ! 

Her walls before thee stand, 
Dear as the apple of thine eye, 

And graven on thy hand. 

For her my tears shall fall, 

For her my prayers ascend ; 
To her my cares and toils be given, 

Till cares and toils shall end. 

Beyond my highest joy 
I prize her heavenly ways, 
Her sweet communion, solemn vows, 
Her hymns of love and praise. 

Sure as thy truth shall last, 

To Zion shall be given 
The brightest glories earth can yield, 
And brighter bliss in heaven. 

And these keys have been your stay in life's conflict, 
your light in sorrows dark hour. It has taught you the law 
of the Lord converting the soul, and that the Lord is your 
shepherd. 



320 



peter's great confession. 



My hope and prayer is that your children and children's 
children may have the kingdom unlocked unto them and enter 
in ; and you, brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, and friends, 
when you come down to old age, when the physicians and 
watchers can do no more, and when earth is receding and the* 
sable curtains of that last night draw about you, may you 
reach out and up with these keys of Divine Promise and 
open heaven's gate, have an abundant entrance and go sweep- 
ing through the gates of the New Jerusalem, washed in the 
blood of the Lamb. Through our Lord and Saviour, you, 
too, have realized, believed and confessed that Jesus is the 
Christ, the Son of the Living God. 



APR 27 1901 




1901 



